Life Saver
by AnEvilRegalFostersFan
Summary: She saved her life...
1. Chapter 1

CMA Legaleze: I hereby and heretofore certify that I do not own the Fosters; I am not being paid anything for writing this or publishing this to this site. All I own is the computer it is written on.

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Something in the atmosphere wasn't right, and Lena could tell Stef noticed it, too. She sat at the dinner table watching her children as they talked about their days and plans for the weekend, smiling at appropriate times, giggling at some antic or another. However, there was a stiffness about it that was barely noticeable.

"Sorry!" Callie said as she rushed into the kitchen, grabbing her plate and heading to the stove to put food on it.

"What happened?" Stef asked as she poured her daughter a glass of water.

"There was a pretty bad accident on Ocean, and Joe got stuck in the middle of traffic from it." Callie sat down at the table, smiling thanks to Stef for the water.

"What did that have to do with you?

"He was my relief. I couldn't leave before he got there."

"Ah. Busy day?" And dinner continued as it was before.

Maybe she was imagining it – Stef seemed to calm a bit. They'd been missing Callie. Maybe that was what was bugging her.

*~THE FOSTERS~*

Callie lay awake staring at her ceiling, listening to Mariana's breathing. It had been long past lights-out, but Callie had a feeling she couldn't quite shake.

She glanced over at her phone and internally groaned. It was 1:00 AM. Tired of just lying on the bed, she got up and quietly made her way downstairs. She looked around, taking in her surroundings as though she was seeing it all for the first time.

Her eyes fell on a picture hanging on the wall. The picture was taken at Girls United, the day that Callie decided once and for all that she wanted a family – _this_ family. Stef and Lena surrounded her on either side, holding her tightly against them – her first official Mama Sandwich. All three of them had tears in their eyes.

She reached up and stroked a finger down each of her moms' faces, and that feeling she'd been having intensified. She felt tears prick her eyes, and she took a deep breath to try and calm them. Why was she suddenly feeling so depressed? Why did she suddenly get this great sense of loss?

Callie took the picture down and headed into the kitchen, sitting down at the island. She stared at it, feeling that loss once again, but this time, she let the tears fall.

"Callie?"

She wouldn't dare look up at the voice. She cleared her throat before answering, "Yeah. Sorry."

"Everything all right?"

Still looking at the picture, she nodded, but her voice seemed stuck in her throat.

She felt a hand on her shoulder before hearing the stool next to her scrape on the floor. She felt herself being pulled toward a body and brunette curls entered her line of vision.

"What's that?" Lena asked as she looked toward the picture frame. Then, she smiled as she saw the picture. "That was a good day – one of the best days of my life."

Callie nodded, two lone tears escaping her eyes and her breath catching in her throat. She felt Lena pull back.

"Honey, what's the matter?"

"I don't know," Callie squeaked as she set the picture down on the table before wiping her eyes and taking a deep breath. She pulled away from Lena and stood. "Maybe I'm just tired." She picked up the frame and began leaving the kitchen.

"Callie—" Lena called gently, but Callie didn't turn around. One look in Lena's eyes, and she'd totally lose it.

*~THE FOSTERS~*

Stef sat at the kitchen island as the sun broke over the horizon, nursing a cup of coffee. Today was her day off, but she usually ended up waking up early anyway to start breakfast.

However, the late-night conversation she had with Lena once her wife came back to bed kept her up the better portion of the rest of the night. The fact that Lena was worried – that fact, alone – worried Stef.

Lena was a worrier by nature, Stef knew, but it was rare that her worries were unfounded, especially when it came to their kids.

" _She was crying, Stef," she had said._

That was enough to wake the cop. Callie didn't cry – not in front of people, anyway. Stef was the only one of the two mothers to ever see her cry, and if Lena saw it, something was definitely up.

" _I'll talk to her," was how Stef ended the conversation, holding her wife close, trying to comfort her as much as she could._

Now, she sat at the kitchen island, deciding cereal was a good enough breakfast, waiting for her older daughter to materialize.

She heard footsteps working their way down the stairs and glanced into the hallway to see Mariana coming down.

"Morning, Miss Thing," she said as the young Latina joined her and poured herself a bowl of Toasted O's.

"Morning," she answered her mother, though it came out more like a grump.

"Why do lovely this morning?" Stef smirked at the look Mariana threw at her.

"You try sleeping with someone tossing and turning and moving all night. You'd be grumpy, too." The young teen sighed. "I think she's having nightmares again. The last time this happened was right after Liam started showing up."

Stef smiled reassuringly at her daughter – or she hoped it was reassuring, at least. She remembered the nights she would sit up with her restless foster daughter while she processed everything she was feeling once she confessed what had happened to her. She remembered the tears the girl had choked back. She remembered her own frustration at herself for not knowing how to help her.

But she smiled at Mariana.

"Don't worry about your sister, Love," Stef said as she stood and took her coffee mug to the sink. As she turned back around, she continued, "Mama and I have her." She walked around to her daughter and kissed her head. "Eat your breakfast. Is Callie up?"

"Yeah, kind of. She seems really out of it."

"Thanks, Baby." Stef kissed her head once more before leaving to go upstairs.

She approached her daughters' room and peered inside. Callie was sitting on her bed, propped up by the wall, eyes closed. She was okay for the moment, so Stef went into her room to where her wife was putting the finishing touches on her make-up.

"I'm going to keep Callie home with me today," Stef told her wife.

Lena gave her a knowing look.

"You think something's up." It was a statement, not a question.

"I don't know anything other than she's sitting against her wall asleep." Stef sat down on the edge of their tub. "Mariana thinks she's having nightmares again, and if she is…"

Lena turned to face her wife. "Do you think I should stay, too?"

Stef shook her head. "I don't think so, Love. We'll be fine."

The brunette nodded. "But call me at lunchtime, please? I want to know what's happening."

Stef smiled as she stood and kissed her wife. "I will," and with that, she left her bathroom and went back to the girls' room. Slowly, she approached the young woman and laid her down, pulling off her shoes and tucking the blanket around her.

She then sat on the bed, watching the girl sleep for a few minutes before heading downstairs to bid the rest of the family farewell. Once everyone was gone, she went back upstairs to climb into Mariana's bed and read a few articles on her phone. If Callie was having nightmares again, Stef wanted to be close.

*~THE FOSTERS~*

She slammed the grant proposal down on the desk after reading the same paragraph five times and it still didn't make any sense. It was nearly nine o'clock, and she hadn't heard anything from Stef on how Callie was. She _did_ say lunchtime, but she couldn't shake this dread that had built up in the pit of her stomach.

She opened a new text message to her wife.

 _How is she?_

 _Doing okay so far,_ came Stef's reply shortly after. _Still sleeping._

 _Okay, keep me posted._

 _I will, Love. Try not to worry._

Lena only smiled at her wife's last comment.

"Mama?" came a voice from her door. She looked up into the eyes of her youngest.

"Hi, Baby," she said as she waved him in. "What's going on? Why aren't you in class?"

"My stomach's kind of hurting." Jude shrugged as he closed her office door and walked over to his mother's side.

Lena reached up and placed her hand on his forehead.

"You're not warm," she observed as she pulled him to her. "Worried about Callie?"

Jude looked down, but nodded.

Lena smiled. Jude was always so easy to read.

"You know she's at home with Mom, right? Mom's taking great care of her."

Jude nodded again. "I know."

Lena smiled at her youngest. "Then, why don't you head back to class, and as soon as Mom checks in with me, I'll fill you in on your sister, all right?"

"Can I stay here for a little while – just until my stomach settles?"

Lena picked up the proposal and headed over to the couch in her office.

"Fifteen minutes, Bud. Then, back to class." She sat down on one end of the couch, inviting Jude to lay his head in her lap. She went back to reading the proposal while combing her fingers through her son's short hair.

Truth be told, she thrived on moments like these where she could be a mom and Vice Principal at the same time. There was a satisfaction in knowing she could be there to comfort them at any point in the day.

Two knocks came on the door a few seconds before it opened, and Monte stuck her head in.

"Hey, Lena," she started but stopped once she saw Jude. "Oh, sorry. Everything okay?"

"Oh, yeah," Lena answered as she glanced down at her son, "worried stomach. Callie's out sick."

"Aww." Monte sat on the coffee table and looked Jude in the eye. "I'm sure Callie's going to be fine. Probably just caught the bug that's going around."

"I'm sure," Lena commented before Jude could say anything. Jude was young, but Lena knew he knew Callie wasn't sick.

Monte smiled. "How's the proposal?"

"I've honestly barely started. I'll have it to you by lunch."

Monte nodded. "Sounds good." She stood up and left the office, wishing Jude well.

*~THE FOSTERS~*

Her first thought as she drifted back into consciousness was that shew as uncomfortable. Her second was why she was coming to begin with. The last thing she remembered was sitting against her wall to relax a minute, and hopefully avoid any questioning glances from Lena and Stef, but now, she was lying down, her head buried in her pillow, covered by her blanket.

She looked up as she heard footsteps at the door. She threw a blank stare at the officer as Stef smiled back at her.

Stef walked over to the bed and knelt down, brushing hair off of Callie's face.

"Morning, Love," Stef said. "Sleep well?"

Callie only nodded slightly.

"You feeling okay, my love?" Stef's brow creased as she continued combing her fingers through Callie's hair.

Again, Callie only nodded.

"You'd tell me if something was wrong, right? Like if you'd started having nightmares again?"

This time, the teen didn't respond with a nod. Instead, she turned her head away to look at the open door.

Callie felt the bed shift as Stef moved to the edge of the bed. There was a sudden weight on her back as Stef leaned down and hugged the girl to her.

"I don't know what's going on, Love," Stef whispered into Callie's ear, "but Mama and I love you, and we want to help you through whatever is bothering you. You want to tell me what that is?"

Callie shrugged.

"No, huh?" Stef kissed the back of her daughter's head.

"No," Callie said as she began turning over to face her mother. Stef sat up and smiled down at the girl. "I don't know."

"You don't know?"

Callie shook her head. How did she explain this sense of loss – this _loneliness_ – that she's been feeling without hurting Stef's feelings? Both moms had been her rock over the last few months, but she still felt left in the world alone. This isn't something she could understand, so how did she explain it to her mother?

Plus, she's being adopted in a week; she should be ecstatic, which makes this all the more confusing.

"What's on your mind, Baby?" Stef's voice cut into her thoughts. Callie looked down at her hands and notices that Stef had taken them, creating this connection between them.

"Nothing." Callie shook her head.

"Okay." Nodding, Stef stood up and patted Callie's leg. "You should get some food in you." The mother reached down and pulled Callie to her feet. "Mama wants me to call her at lunchtime, and if I don't tell her you've at least eaten, she's liable to come home early and kill me." She began heading out of the room. "Besides, maybe you'll feel a little better once you have some food in your stomach."

Callie followed her mom downstairs and into the kitchen where there were two sandwiches sitting on the table. She sat down at one of them and began nibbling on it.

"Water or juice?"

Callie startled a bit. "Hm?"

Stef smiled back at her. "To drink, Love. Water or juice?"

"Oh. Water, please."

Stef put a glass of water down in front of Callie before pouring herself one and joining the girl at the kitchen island.

Callie took a drink, watching Stef carefully. the woman ha something up her sleeve, Callie knew. Stef always had a way to make the teen talk, and there was something about that fact made her nervous.

*~THE FOSTERS~*

Lena pulled into her driveway and sat for a moment. After Jude had gone back to class, Monte had come back to her office, giving her permission to take an extended lunch if she wanted to go home and check on Callie - an opportunity she gladly took. She wasn't sure why, but she had the sudden need to be near her daughter, like if she took too much time away, she may not be there when she gets back.

Her morning had been consumed with this thought-provoking worry over her girl, but she surprised herself when she finished the final edit of the grant proposal. After handing it over to her boss, she mentioned she _was_ taking an extended lunch and left the building.

Now, she was home, and a part of her was afraid of what she might find inside. She knew her wife was perfectly capable of taking care of their children, but as much as she loved the woman, Stef wasn't the most subtle of parents. Would Callie actually be feeling better after spending the morning with Stef, or would she be feeling worse?

Steeling herself to believe the former, Lena got out of her car and journeyed inside. The house was practically devoid of life; no one was in the living room, dining room, or kitchen. She stood at the sink and smiled as she glanced outside into the backyard.

Stef was sitting on a blanket in the grass, Callie's head in her lap. Every so often, Callie's arm would point to the sky, and Stef would look up and either agree or laugh a little. Once or twice, Stef would point to the sky and make a comment to which Callie would reciprocate.

 _This_ was how she loved to see Callie. She loved seeing Callie so relaxed, and she wished the girl could remain that way, but Lena knew Callie wouldn't begin to permanently relax until her adoption was final. One more week until the teen who'd come to her with a bruised face and bloody lip would finally be hers.

She turned back to the refrigerator to pull out the pitcher of water and poured herself a glass. When the back door opened, she jumped slightly before turning and seeing her wife coming inside.

"Lena?" Stef said, a bit confused. "Not that I'm not happy to see you, but what are you doing here?"

"I - uh - took an extended lunch," Lena replied as she smiled at the confusion on her wife's face. "I wanted to check on Callie."

"Oh?"

"Yeah." Lena sat down on one of the stools, taking a drink from her glass. "How is she?"

Stef sat on the stool next to her wife. "Well," she started, "she's overwhelmed, Lena. I think she just needs this adoption to be over and final before something else happens."

Lena took a deep breath. "One more week, and she'll be ours - legally. No more guesswork; no more limbo; no more waiting."

"Yeah." Stef nodded. "Now, it's just getting through that week." She reached out and took Lena's hand. "I think we should keep an eye on her though, Love."

Lena laced her fingers through her wife's. "Why?"

"Let's just call it a gut feeling. I can't explain it, but I'm not taking any chances, either." When Lena only nodded, Stef continued, "So, uh, go on outside. I'm sure she'd love to see you."

The brunette nodded again and stood, pecking Stef on the lips before heading outside to the girl.

"Hey, Sweetheart," she said as she approached the blanket. "Mind if I join you?"

Callie sat up, surprised.

"Hi," she said. "Um, sure." Once Lena was seated, she turned her mother. "Is it that late all ready?"

Lena laughed a little. "No, no," she answered. "I took an extended lunch. I wanted to see how you were feeling. You doing okay?"

"Uh, yeah. I'm okay."

"You sure?"

"Mmhmm." Callie nodded slightly as she began playing with the edge of the blanket.

Lena watched as Callie avoided her eyes. Something about that unnerved the mother, so she reached out and placed a hand on Callie's shoulder.

"Sweetheart," Lena started, "will you look at me, please?" It took the girl a few minutes, but Callie eventually met Lena's gaze. Lena's breath caught in her throat as she realized what Stef was talking about. The girl's eyes held a sorrow and helplessness so deep that Lena felt the abyss open in her own gut, swallowing her heart.

"Honey," she continued, "I know you and I aren't as close as I know _I_ would like us to be, but you don't have to hide from me. I'm not going to walk away from you; I'm not going to leave you to figure things out on your own. I love you so, _so_ much, and I hate seeing you like this. You can talk to me about anything; you know that, right?"

Callie nodded slightly, giving her mother a quick smile, which Lena reciprocated before pulling her in slightly and placing a series of kisses on her forehead. She pulled back and was pleasantly surprised when Callie moved closer to Lena and leaned her head on the matriarch's shoulder.

Lena placed another kiss on her daughter's head. Her worries hadn't been abated, as she'd hoped they would; rather, they were intensified. Stef was right; they were going to have to keep a close watch on the girl.

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A/N: Hello, all! Thanks for checking out my new Fosters story. For those of you who are reading "What If", I will be continuing it as soon as I can. I've had a few hiccups that Life's thrown at me, and it's left me with virtually no inspiration what-so-ever for the next "story" of "What If". I am working on it, however. With any luck, the next few days will be easier, and I'll actually be able to finish writing the next installment, and it should be updated by the weekend. Fingers crossed!


	2. Chapter 2

**Author's Note:** Wow, guys! Thanks so much for the favorites, follows and reviews! Won't lie, it's nice to wake up in the morning after posting late at night to 20 e-mails about your story!

 **CMA Legal Stuff:** The Fosters aren't mine; they'll never be mine. But their lives are fun to play with...heh heh heh.

* * *

 **Chapter 2**

Jude walked to his mama's office, his mind caught in what he was going to tell her. He was supposed to be already heading home for the day, but the worry he'd been feeling about his sister never quit, so he went for a walk along the beach, missing all of the rest of his classes after lunch. He couldn't concentrate anyway, so it made no sense to him to stay.

At lunch, he went to eat with Lena, but learned she'd left the building for lunch, and he figured she'd gone home to check on Callie. He couldn't help but wonder if something had happened that she left, and that extra worry crept into his stomach, making any and all concentration impossible for the remainder of the day.

As he rounded a corner, he nearly collided with Mariana.

"Jude!" she exclaimed. "Thank goodness! Mama is freaking out! Where'd you go?"

"I just walked the beach," Jude replied.

"Well, come on." She grabbed his hand and began pulling him toward the office. "Though, you should probably come up with something better than that to tell them."

"Them?"

"Yeah. Mom and Callie are here, too. When Melanie showed up and said you weren't in class, Mama checked your attendance and freaked."

They entered the outer area of the office. Stef was pacing the floor while staring at her phone. Lena sat in one of the desk chairs, her head resting on steepled fingertips and eyes closed.

Both women turned when they heard the door and breathed a collective sigh of relief. They came around to the front of the counter and approached the duo.

"Not okay, Jude," Lena said as she wrapped her arms around the boy.

"Where were you, young man?" Stef asked, her arms crossed.

Jude shifted uncomfortably under his mothers' scrutiny as he answered softly, "Along the beach."

"Why?" Lena asked very simply.

Jude couldn't answer, so he just looked to the ground.

Stef let out a frustrated sigh and looked to Mariana.

"Please text your sister and brothers," she asked of her daughter, "and let them know he's all right." She turned to the young boy as Mariana pulled out her phone and began texting. "You are coming with us."

Jude was pulled into a side hug with Stef as she began leading him toward her wife's office.

Once inside, Stef gently pushed him toward the couch and sat down on the coffee table in front of him. Lena closed the door before joining her wife. Jude sat back, keeping is eyes on his hands.

"I don't think we have to say how not-okay this was, Jude," Lena started as she leaned forward. "You scared me half to death! What happened?"

Jude only shrugged.

"That's not an answer, bud," Stef said. "We want an answer."

Jude continued to stare at his hands.

"Okay," Stef breathed as Lena took over, "Monte will be speaking to you tomorrow about this, and mom and I will be talking about consequences at home."

"And rest assured, Jude, this will _never_ happen again. Am I clear?" Stef wasn't taking the slight nod from Jude this time. "Answer, please."

Jude looked up at the two moms. "Yes."

Both moms shot him a warning look, but Jude only matched their gazes before they told him to head out to the cars where he was immediately bombarded by questions and reprimands from his siblings.

"Jude," Callie started once everyone else had their chance, "What has gotten into you? Why would you—"

"Back off, Callie," Jude snapped.

"No, Jude! Something could have happened to you—something horrible."

"Like what? I get sunburned?"

"No, but—"

"I'm thirteen; I'm not stupid!"

"I never said you were!"

"But you think it, Callie. It's in how you act around me and how you treat me!"

As Callie opened her mouth to argue, a voice came from behind him, "What's going on?" But Jude ignored it.

"You're my sister, Callie," he continued heatedly. "You're not my mother. I already have two parents—" He turned to address all of the siblings. "—I don't need four more. Thank you."

Jude turned and began heading away from the cars.

"Jude!" Lena called as she grabbed his shoulders. "Where are you going?"

Without turning around, he answered, "I'm walking home."

Stef walked over to where Lena was with the boy. "Don't you think you've done enough walking today?" she asked.

Jude shrugged. "So, ground me, but I'm walking home."

"Watch your tone with me, young man. You're in enough trouble without adding an attitude to it."

"You know," Lena chimed in before anyone could respond to her wife, "a walk actually sounds really nice right now." Keys jingled somewhere behind him. "Brandon, will you drive my car home, and we'll meet you there?"

"Yeah, sure," Brandon answered. "Jude, do you want us to take your backpack home?"

"I think that's an excellent idea," Stef answered for him as she took his bag off his back and handed it to Brandon. "See you at home?" This, Jude assumed, was asked to Lena since she answered in the affirmative before beginning to lead Jude toward the street.

*~THE FOSTERS~*

Lena walked beside Jude for about five minutes, trying to figure out what was going on with her son. The two of them were always close, but today was different. He seemed more angry than anything, but what baffled Lena was what he could possibly be angry about.

"So, you to tell me what's going on?" She asked as she placed a hand on his shoulder.

He shrugged her off as he replied curtly, "Nothing."

"Jude, this doesn't seem like nothing. What has you so worked up?" When he remained quiet, she turned toward a bench along the side and sat him down.

"Okay," she said as she leaned toward him, resting her elbows on her knees, "Jude this isn't like you. Please talk to me." Nothing. "Did something happen at school?" Nothing. "Did something happen between you and Connor?" Still, nothing. "Is this about Callie?" It was slight, but he moved. "I see." She took his hands into her own. "Honey, Callie is going to be okay. Mom and I are doing everything we can for her."

"But what if it's not enough?" Jude pulled his hands from Lena's. "I've seen a lot with her. I've never seen her like this."

"Jude, Mom and I are not going to let anything happen to your sister."

"But..."

"But what?"

"What if she runs again? What if you can't be there to help her?" He moved to stand up. "You can't be everywhere all the time." He stood and began walking again.

"Jude," Lena called as she stood and went after him, but Jude kept walking. "Jude, stop." She caught up to him and stood in front of him, blocking his path. "Listen to me. We will do absolutely everything in our power to keep her safe. She is getting adopted in a week, and there's nothing at this point that can stop it." Lena smiled when Jude looked up at her. "Nothing, Bud, and even if something would come up, Mom and I will handle it, all right?" When Jude nodded slightly, she turned her sone toward home and resumed walking.

Lena only wished that Jude could shed some light on what was happening with his sister, but with him admitting he'd never seen Callie like this, she wondered what kind of uncharted waters they were heading into.

*~THE FOSTERS~*

Once both cars were in the driveway, Stef directed all the older teens to the living room. She was already worried about Callie's disposition, but now, Jude taking off... She couldn't help worrying more.

All four teens situated themselves on the couch, so Stef sat in the front of them on the coffee table.

"All right, guys," she started to get their attention, "I know you were all worried. What Jude did scared us all, and while Mama and I will never stop you from talking about your feelings, you need to leave the parenting up to us..."

"He doesn't get to do that," Callie blurted out. "He doesn't get to disappear like that! If I can't run away, neither can he!"

"Love, I really don't think he was trying to run away. I think he was worried about you and trying not to and needed to get that energy out."

"Then, why didn't he just go to Mama's office?" Mariana asked sitting up.

"We don't know he didn't. He could have, and Mama was here, checking on Callie. We don't know everything that happened. Actually, we know very little of what went on today to make him leave, since he's not so inclined to tell us what's going through his mind." Stef stood. "Guys, just please leave the parenting to us. You guys worry about teenage issues like homework, clothes, and boyfriends or girlfriends. Okay?" She smiled at the teens before heading into the kitchen to start dinner.

As she was pulling the chicken and vegetables out of the refrigerator, she noticed a body at the kitchen island. She set the raw veggies down, and Callie picked up a knife and began chopping in silence.

Stef opened the chicken and began preparing it, keeping a wary eye on Callie. Jude leaving the school gave her a slight reprieve from worrying about his sister, but knowing Jude was with Lena gave her ample time to now concentrate on the troubles of the girl.

"I'm sorry," the girl started as she chopped through a carrot.

"For what, Love?" Stef asked while adding some spices to the chicken.

"Trying to parent Jude." The girl smiled sheepishly. "I guess old habits really are hard to break." She pulled another carrot in front of her and began chopping. It's just...when Lena called and said she'd left school, I thought-"

Stef washed her hands in the sink before going and standing beside the teen and placing her hand on the girl's shoulder.

Callie continued, "I don't know what I would've done if something happened to him."

Stef reached in front of Callie and placed the knife down on the table before turning the girl to face her.

"Listen to me, Callie," Stef began as she stood in front of the girl and took the girl's face into her hands. "Jude is fine. He came back and is with Mama, so stop worrying. He's safe, and so are you."

Callie looked up at her. "I'm not..."

Stef only smiled a knowing smile. "Baby, you've been walking around here for the past two days with the same look you had when you first got here. The only thing is, Mama and I have no idea what happened to trigger this, and it does worry us." When Callie said nothing in response, Stef went around behind the girl and held her close. "We love you, Callie, and nothing is ever going to change that. You aren't adopted yet, but that all changes in six more days. You are already ours in our hearts, and soon, you will be legally, too."

"What if the judge says no?" Callie leaned back against Stef.

"Then, we appeal, and keep fighting until we have you."

"Then why do I feel like I'm going to lose you?"

"What do you mean, Love?" Stef asked as she pulled back slightly and looked at the girl. "You're not going to lose us." Stef saw the girl physically close herself off. She went around to the front of Callie again, this time sitting on the stool and looking the girl in the eye. "Uh, uh, Love. Don't do that. Talk to me. What's going through your head?"

"We need to finish dinner, Stef."

"Dinner can wait a few minutes, Callie..."

"After dinner, Stef. I'll tell you and Lena." When Stef threw her a doubtful look, she exclaimed, "I promise. I just don't want to do it more than once."

"All right, Love." Stef stood and pulled Callie into a quick hug and kissed her temple. "Cut the carrots a little bit smaller, Love. They'll take forever to cook like this."

*~THE FOSTERS~*

The house had been dark for hours when she made her way down the stairs and out the front door. She hated keeping secrets from her foster moms, but this was something she needed to do on her own.

She made her way down the street to the nearest bus stop after checking to be sure she locked the front door. The closest stop was just outside the homeowner's association, so she had a few blocks to walk, but she didn't mind. The walk gave her time to think.

Almost seven years ago, she'd lost her mother. It's been almost seven years since she'd been ripped out of her normal way of life and thrown into this whirlwind of a new life called foster care. Seven years, and she was finally comfortable enough to go and visit her.

This feeling - whatever it is - had gotten worse after she talked to Lena and Stef, despite the reassurances that they understood. They may have understood, but she still felt guilty. Guilty for making them worry; guilty for making them think they hadn't done enough (which she assured them was _not_ true); guilty for wanting them to be her moms; guilty that it was costing them dearly to make her one dream come true.

A pang ripped through her stomach, and she had to stop for a minute – guilty, because she was doing this without them, without their knowledge.

She reached in her pocket and double checked her phone. It was on an fully charged. If they needed to find her, they could, she reasoned and continued her trek to the stop.

After another fifteen minutes, she arrived at the stop and checked the time for the next bus. 6:27 AM, the sign read. She checked her phone – 4:24 AM.

She continued walking. Sitting still for that length of time increased the chances of Stef or Lena walking and finding her. Plus, it's not like she didn't know where shew as going. She'd walk until the buses began running, and hop a bus later.

By the time the buses were running, she was only a few blocks away from her destination. Ten more minutes, and she'd arrive at her mother's grave.

She stopped at the gate to the cemetery and sat down, waiting for the gates to unlock. She didn't have long to wait before she heard the electronic lock open, and she was once again on her feet and heading toward her mother.

The grave wasn't hard to find, really. She lay on the top of the hill, all the way to the back. When her mother had died, that was what they could afford based on what was left to them, and honestly, she was all right with it. It kept her time with her mother private.

She knelt down in front of the headstone, running her fingers over the engraved name. The tombstone was weathered from neglect, and she felt horrible about it. She should've made more time to come and see her mom, but it was hard – impossible – with the life she was given. Not an excuse, she knew, but still, she felt at least an effort should've been made, no matter what her consequences.

Two tears fell down her cheeks as she pulled the vines off of the stone. She uncovered her mother's epitaph – Beloved mother, wife, and daughter.

 _That's right,_ Callie thought to herself, _our grandmother's buried here somewhere, too_ God, the guilt just kept coming!

Finally, she just let the dam open and the flood consume her until she fell into a deep sleep, her head pillowed by the crook of her arm. Not even the vibrations of her phone pulled her out of her slumber.

* * *

Chapter 3 coming soon!


	3. Chapter 3

**Author's Note:** Thanks again, everyone for the awesome feedback, favorites, and follows. It really does keep me writing and present in this story. I got a request for the talk between Lena, Stef, and Callie in the last chapter, and I included some of it here, but if you're interested in seeing it in its entirety, leave me a comment in a review, and I'll consider writing it out completely in a separate fic.

 **CMA Legal Stuff:** I do not own the Fosters; I do not own ABC Family; I do not own Disney...though, it would be awesome if I did...(sigh)

* * *

 **Chapter 3**

 _The teen looked at the two moms and put her hands into her shorts pockets. "Why did you bring me here?"_

 _Stef went around to the front of the girl so she could look her in the eye. "You love the beach," she said frankly._

 _"How do you know that?"_

 _Lena joined Stef in front of the teen. "Because you're our daughter, and it's our job to know these things about you."_

 _"But I've never told you..."_

 _"Love," Stef interrupted gently, "we may not know everything there is to know about you yet, but one thing we do know is what relaxes you. When you're here, your entire disposition changes. You seem much more like a sixteen-year-old girl without a care in the world, as sixteen-year-olds should be, rather than a sixteen-year-old with every burden in the world on her shoulders."_

 _Lena picked up, "We also know how hard it is for you to talk to us about things in general, so we wanted to make sure you were as relaxed as possible. So, we brought you here."_

 _Callie nodded before she looked down and kicked an incoming wave._

" _You know," she said softly, "I used to think I could turn into a mermaid when I was little." Stef's arm was on the girl's back, rubbing up and down gently, encouraging her to continue. "Our mom would bring us to the beach, and I would sit in the surf with my feet buried in the sand, and when she asked what I was doing, I would tell her I was waiting for my fins to grow." She laughed slightly as she kicked another wave. "Apparently, I was obsessed with Ariel."_

" _I don't know of a girl who wasn't obsessed with one Disney princess or another," Lena commented as they all began walking again, but all noticed the uncomfortable silence._

 _Callie stopped after a few minutes and gazed out at the now nearly-set sun._

 _"Do you ever wonder..."_

 _The two moms stopped and turned to the girl._

 _"Do we ever wonder what, Love?" Stef slowly made her way over to the girl, suddenly needing to be close to her._

 _"Where do you think you'd end up if you just started floating on a wave?"_

 _"I don't think I've ever really thought about it, if I'm honest." Lena came up on the other side of her and looped her arm through the teen's._

 _"What about you, Love?" Stef asked as she followed Lena's example and looped her arm through the teen's other arm. "Where would you end up?"_

 _"I'd sink," Callie said as she stared toward the horizon, tears brimming in her eyes._

 _Stef rested her chin on the girl's shoulder. "No, you wouldn't. Mama and I would hold you up."_

 _Callie shook her head. "I'd pull you down with me."_

 _"Then I guess it's good we are expert swimmers." Stef pulled Callie in close and placed a kiss on the girl's temple. "I didn't take the rescue swimming courses for nothin'." Stef smiled in an attempt to alleviate some of the tension._

 _Lena went to stand in front of the girl._

 _"Callie, honey," she said as she pushed some hair behind Callie's ear, but Callie just walked away from both mothers, into the ocean. They watched her for a moment, until she seemed to be up to her waist._

 _"Come back to shore," Stef called, but Callie didn't hear or didn't want to listen, Lena couldn't tell. The skies around them burned a crimson red, the ocean waves reflecting the light in the sky, turning it the color of blood._

 _That was the moment when Callie sank beneath the waves. Within seconds, Lena and Stef had gone into the surf, looking for the teen beneath the waves, desperate to find their daughter._

 _"Callie?!" Lena screamed into the waves, the wind blowing harder around them. Sea water splashed her in the face, the salt water mixing with her falling tears. "CALLIE!" She turned and saw her wife dive beneath the rising waves, only to come up empty handed and dive back down._

 _In the distance, there were sirens getting louder...and louder...and louder..._

Her alarm went off at seven, and Lena's eyes snapped open. As she reached to turn it off, she turned over onto her back, letting out a few deep breaths to calm her racing heart and thanking God the night before hadn't ended the way her dream had. Every mother's greatest fear was losing one of her children, be in in a dream or in reality, and as of last night, Lena had now experienced both, and she honestly couldn't tell you which one hurt more. What she could tell you was she _never_ wanted to feel it again – ever.

She turned her head and glanced into the bathroom, staring at her wife's nearly bare back. Stef had switched weekends with Mike at the last minute because of what was happening with Callie, and today, they were starting early to talk to her some more. Maybe, she speculated, they may even be able to convince the girl to get some extra voluntary counseling.

They had taken her to the beach to relax her, since that was where she found the most solace, and the conversation they had left both mothers with more questions for the girl than answers. Granted, Callie had done quite a bit of talking, but one of those questions raised, sadly, was whether or not they were equipped to actually help the girl.

That question is what spurned the early wake-up this morning, despite it being Saturday. She and her wife had talked long into the night once they had come home and the children were all asleep, and the only conclusive agreement they could come to was that Callie may need outside help. The only question remaining, at this point, was whether or not Callie would be receptive to the idea.

Lena sighed as she sat up, hoping that the teen would be. She stretched and smiled at her wife as Stef walked out of their bathroom.

"What?" Stef asked as she picked up the tank top she was going to wear for the day.

"Nothing," Lena smirked. "Just admiring the view."

Stef raised her eyebrows and smirked back. "Yeah?" She leaned down and kissed her wife.

Lena stood and made her way into the bathroom to get ready for the day while Stef headed out of the room.

Once she was freshened up, she made her way downstairs where she saw her wife nursing a cup of coffee. Lena grabbed a cup for herself and turned toward her wife.

"You think we should allow Callie a cup of coffee?" she asked.

Stef threw her a disbelieving look. "I'm sorry," she joked, "do I know you?"

"Stop it." Lena rolled her eyes. "I'm serious. One cup shouldn't hurt, right?"

Stef only smiled and shook her head before standing and taking the cup from her wife. "Why don't you go wake her while I pour?"

Lena nodded as she turned and made her way back upstairs to her daughters' room, but stopped in her tracks when she saw Callie's bed empty. "Oh, no," she whispered to herself as she hurried to the bathroom the kids all shared. Finding it empty, she made her way over to the room Jude and Jesus shared, hoping to find the girl with her brother.

No such luck.

Lena took a few seconds to compose herself. _Don't panic,_ she told herself as she went back into the girls' room and opened the closet. Callie's blue duffel bag was still in the bottom; her clothes still hung on the rack.

"Mama?" came a voice from behind her.

"It's okay, Baby." Lena turned around, slowly, trying to mask her worry before facing her younger daughter. "Go on back to sleep."

"What's wrong?"

"Nothing. Nothing's wrong." The woman went over to the girl's bed and gently pushed the tired teen back against her pillows before kissing her forehead. "Go back to sleep. Love you."

Mariana turned over under her covers and mumbled, "Love you, too."

Once she was sure Mariana was back to sleep, Lena hurried back downstairs to her wife. Before Stef could register her wife's mood, the brunette blurted out, "She's not here."

Stef startled, nearly sputtering in her coffee.

"Excuse me?!"

"She's not here, Stef." Lena began pacing the length of the island. "Her bed's empty, but all of her clothes are here."

"Does she have her cell phone?"

"I don't know. I didn't see it. What if..." She stopped pacing and turned to her wife. "Stef, she wouldn't..."

"No." Stef turned a stern glare at Lena. "No, she wouldn't do that again." She went over to her wife and pulled her into an embrace. "She wouldn't. I know it."

Lena held onto her wife, drawing strength from the cop.

"Let's go wake the others and see if any of them know anything."

The two went back upstairs, going into each room asking if any of them know about Callie's whereabouts. However, after receiving negative answers, Stef went searching for Callie's cell phone. Not finding it, she pulled out her own and tried calling the girl. When Callie didn't pick up, Stef opened the tracking app.

"Mama?" came Jude's voice.

Lena turned to her son and caught the look of fear on his face. She smiled sympathetically, opening her arms and inviting him in.

"It's all right, Jude," She tried to sound reassuring. "Mom will find her."

"Hm..." Stef made her way over to where the others had also gathered with Lena and Jude.

Lena looked up. "What?"

Stef showed the map to her wife and son. "She's at _Mount Hope_."

"Why would she be there?"

"Our mom's buried there," Jude answered softly.

Lena instinctively tightened her embrace around the boy, looking up to her wife.

Stef only nodded and placed a hand on Jude's arm. She looked back at Lena. "You'll stay here?"

Lena nodded slightly. "Just let me know what's happening, all right?"

Stef smiled and headed back downstairs. After gathering her keys and jacket, she left for _Mount Hope_.

Lena looked around at the worried glances on her children's faces. She let out a breath and smiled at them. "Well, since we're all up, let's get dressed, and I'll go start breakfast. What am I making?"

"Pancakes."

"Eggs."

"Biscuits and gravy."

"Okay, whoa." Lena put her hands up in surrender. "How about pancakes and eggs, and we'll do biscuits and gravy tomorrow morning?" The children all agreed and went their own ways to get ready for the day while Lena went to go begin making breakfast.

~*THE FOSTERS*~

She felt the warmth of the sun's rays on her face before she opened her eyes, squinting in the harsh light. Callie sat up, confused by her surroundings, but only for a few seconds. When she realized where she was, she reached around frantically for her phone.

She was laying on it, and the moment she picked it up, she noticed at least twenty missed calls from Stef along with text messages from both mothers to go with them. Her stomach bottomed out, but she read through them.

There were a few, _Where are you?_ texts; a couple, _Are you okay?_ texts; even fewer, _Are you hurt?_ texts. There were more, _We love you and need to know you're safe,_ and _Please answer me, Love!_ texts, but the final one is what really caught her attention.

 _I'm at the bottom of the hill when you're ready,_ it read.

Callie slowly turned and looked down to the path. Sure enough, there was Stef, sitting on a bench, doing something on her phone - probably texting Lena, Callie figured.

She reached up and wiped hair off of her face before standing and brushing her clothes free of the grass clippings. Slowly, she began walking down the hill toward her foster mother.

She stopped. When did _that_ happen? She hadn't thought of Stef and Lena as foster moms in months. They've been her moms in her head ever since she came home from Girls United.

Callie began walking again, slower than before. She felt suddenly lost, looking for direction.

Stef stood up and made her way over to the girl. One touch, Callie knew, was all it would take for her to completely crumble, but she found it hard to turn away, or pull away, when all the blonde did was open her arms, an invitation to be comforted.

Callie allowed Stef to hold her, and soon found her own arms being wrapped around the woman. Her tears had started flowing, despite her resolve to stop them.

She felt Stef rub her back and hold her tight. She drew on that strength to keep her on her feet. She also found herself clinging to Stef as though this was her last chance, and she was silently begging the chance not to go away.

"You're okay, Love" Stef whispered in the teen's ear as she combed her fingers through the girl's hair. "I'm here. You're okay." They stayed that way for another few minutes before Callie pulled out of it, wiping her eyes on her sleeve.

"I'm sorry," Callie said as she looked to the ground.

"For what?" Stef reached up and brushed the last of the tears away with her thumb.

"I got your shirt all wet..." Callie had to take a deep breath. "And I left without leaving a note, and I didn't' answer your calls or texts, and..." So much for keeping the tears in. "...I'm such a mess right now, and I don't know why! I'm sorry you have to put up with this - with me."

Stef grabbed Callie's face and forced the girl to look into her eyes.

"I am going to make something perfectly clear to you," the blonde cop started. "Mama and I do _not_ 'put up' with any of you. You are our children, and we love you. We love every tiny bit of you - even your not-so-smart decisions.

"Now, crying - no apology is needed. It's part of being a mom, and we love when you come to us for comfort. We won't ever turn you away for needing it – even if it means a few soaked shoulders. This isn't the first, and I certainly hope it won't be the last. You can come to either of us, and I think you know that.

"As for you taking off this morning, that is something we'll discuss together with Mama at home, but please, honey, believe me when I say that we aren't going to love you less." Stef looked the girl in the eye. "Yes?"

Callie nodded and went back into Stef's arms.

"Okay." Stef gave the girl one final squeeze. "Let's head home and talk to Mama." They began walking back toward Stef's SUV, but as they got closer, Callie began hanging back.

"What is it, Love?" Stef stopped beside her.

"Do we have to go back to the house?" Callie asked, her voice hoarse from all the crying. "I mean, right away? Can't we just meet somewhere to talk? I'm just not ready to go back quite yet."

Stef nodded, but Callie wasn't sure about the expression on her face. It seemed to be a mixture of concern and confusion, but Callie was also a bit apprehensive about asking about it, too.

"Why don't you get in, Love, and I'll call Mama and let her know, all right?" Stef pulled out her phone and unlocked it. "In the meantime, try to think of a place you want to go to for breakfast. You would've had to be up pretty early to walk all the way here from home, so I doubt you had anything to eat before you left."

Callie involuntarily leaned slightly into Stef's touch and continued toward the car.


	4. Chapter 4

A/N: Sorry! I know I'm a week late, but in my defense, it's been a really LONG week. Thank you all so much, again, for all your reviews, favorites, and follows. Your words are so encouraging!

CMA Legal Stuff: I still don't own The Fosters. (sigh) I know, sad state of affairs.

* * *

Chapter 4

Words were everything, and both women knew that Callie chose her words carefully. Everything she said had a meaning (sometimes more than one) - a slight glimpse behind her suddenly refortified wall.

The dream she'd had - "Do you ever wonder where you'd end up if you could just float on a wave?" In the actual conversation, each mom had given a destination, but when asked, Callie's answer - "I'd sink" - on some level, scared them.

The phone call from Stef didn't help matters, either. Callie hadn't said, "home." Instead, it was, "the house." She couldn't help but fear that they were beginning to lose the girl again. Her adoption was taking too long, and she was beginning to give up hope on the two women.

Lena leaned on the hood of the Toyota and played with the hem on her sweater as she took a deep breath, praying that wasn't the case. She saw her wife pull into the parking lot of Anchor Beach, and as soon as the car stopped, Stef leaned over and said something to Callie. Within seconds, the teen was getting out of the car and heading toward Lena.

The young girl stopped just before reaching the brunette mother and waited. Lena stood from the Prius and held her hand out, smiling slightly, encouraging Callie to step into her arms. She breathed out a sigh of relief when she felt Callie's arms wrap around her torso, as she pulled the girl close. Lena hadn't realized the effect that finding the teen missing had had on her until that moment when the girl was back in her arms.

Stef got out and joined the two. She smiled slightly as she came up beside her wife and placed a hand on Callie's back.

"Come on, Loves," she started as she wrapped her other arm around her wife. "Let's get some breakfast."

~*THE FOSTERS*~

Breakfast was quiet, and Stef pretty much knew why. Callie has been down - way down - and both mothers wanted nothing more than to lift her up, but they were at a virtual loss.

The two mothers had fostered children who suffered from depression before. However, those children were never permanent. At the time, Lena and Stef hadn't been looking to adopt, so they signed up to be emergency placement only, which meant that they ended up with mostly children of recently deceased parents. While they would've loved to help the children get through their grief, the women also had to keep some sort of distance (both were known to get attached rather quickly), so they would get the children - young or teen - started in therapy. The state would then take them and deliver them to the family members that were going to ultimately be responsible.

Now, though, she and her wife were that family. These were uncharted waters for the two, not that that made any difference. Stef would gladly navigate whatever treacherous waters the girl could throw at her, or pulled her into. So would Lena. Everyone would be stronger on the other side. They would get her through this - Stef was determined.

After they finished their meal, they drove back to Anchor Beach to pick up Lena's car and head home. Callie was going to ride with Lena this time, but both mothers watched as she got out of the car and walked past the Toyota and onto the beach.

She heard a sigh beside her and looked over to see tears in her wife's eyes.

"Look at her, Stef," Lena said as she wiped a tear from her cheek. "When she hugged me earlier, it felt..."

"...like she was holding on for dear life?" Stef finished for her. At Lena's knowing nod, Stef continued, "I know, and you didn't see her at the cemetery. I don't know how long she was out, but I know she was in a deep sleep - possibly the first in a long time. I must have sat there beside her for nearly ten minutes, playing with her curls trying to rouse her, but she never even stirred." Stef turned the SUV off and turned to her wife. "She needs help, Lena, and the sooner, the better."

Lena nodded. "We should talk to her, then. I, at least, want her to have some say in this."

The two women got out of the car and began walking toward where Callie sat in the sand. As they approached, Callie hurried to stand and face them. Stef held out a hand to tell her to stay seated while she and Lena joined the girl.

"Mama and I want to talk to you, Sweets," Stef started.

"More like get your opinion on something," Lena clarified.

"Right." Stef smiled at the girl. "We would like to know how you would feel about a more individual, voluntary therapy." Stef placed a hand on the girl's shoulder to still any objections she was going to voice. "Hear us out before you object."

Lena took up the conversation. "I have a friend who is a counselor. She's not court-appointed. She actually refuses to work with the courts. Anyway, she has an office near the drop-in center where you were volunteering. I was - well, _we_ were - hoping you might be open to the idea of going and talking to her, even if it's for a short while."

"What do you think, Love?" Stef rubbed her hand up and down Callie's back, trying to relax her.

'If I don't like it, I can stop?" Callie asked, not taking her eyes off the horizon. She seemed transfixed, to Stef, only blinking every so often to moisten her eyes.

"Under the condition that you'll really try, yes." Stef brushed Callie's hair behind her head.

"I think you'll like her, though," Lena chimed in while wrappingCallie's arm in her own. "Mariana did, after six different therapists."

Stef's phone rang, and she looked down at the caller ID: Brandon.

"Be right back, Loves," Stef said as she stood and walked away from the two, answering the phone as she went.

"Hi, Mom," Brandon started, "we were wondering when you guys were coming home. Jude's getting a bit punchy."

Stef let out a small laugh. "Jude?"

"Yeah. I think he thinks she ran away again."

"Well, one thing's for sure - she did _not_ run away. She is fine, and we've got her. She's just not quite ready to come home yet."

"Why? I mean..."

"B," Stef interrupted, "there's no rhyme or reason. Right now, she's just not."

"Will she be?"

"Yes, Love, she will be. tell Jude that she's okay; she didn't run away; and we'll talk to him when we get home, all right? One of us - if not all of us - will be home in an hour or so."

"Okay; I'll tell him, but I don't know how he's going to take it. He's pretty upset."

"All right. Thanks, B." Before either of them hung up, Stef said, "I love you."

"Love you, too, Mom. Bye."

"Bye, baby." Stef hung up her phone and went back to her wife and daughter.

"Everything okay?" Lena asked as Stef approached.

"Oh, yeah. Punchy kids - nothing new." Stef looked at Callie's new position. She was laying on her back, her head pillowed by Lena's lap. Every few seconds, Lena would brush hair away from the girl's forehead that the ocean breeze would stubbornly place back. "You look comfortable," Stef said to Callie as she sat back down in the sand. "You're going to have sand in places you never imagined, though. Just a warning."

"I already do," Callie answered her as she turned back over to look at Stef. She smiled slightly, and Stef smiled back.

"So, Callie and I had an interesting conversation while you were on the phone," Lena said.

"Oh?" Stef commented as she looked up at her wife. "What about?"

"She's willing to give the counseling a try."

"Yeah?" Stef raised her eyebrows. "I'm so glad to hear that, Baby." Stef leaned down and left a kiss on Callie's forehead.

"We both are."

"I want to be okay," Callie said softly. "I really do. I don't want to feel like this anymore. I want to be happy; I want to be excited about being adopted." She reached out and took Stef's hand. I don't want you worrying about me anymore."

At that, both mothers let out a laugh. "Oh, Love," Stef lifted Callie's hand and kissed her palm, "we're moms. Worrying is what we do."

"That's right," Lena chimed in. "If it's not about something like this, it would be school."

"Or work."

"Or you driving a car."

"Or the movie you're watching."

"Or your future ambitions."

Callie laughed. "Okay, okay; I get it. You worry." She sat up. "I guess we should head home, huh?"

Lena and Stef looked at each other and smiled. She'd said, "home," not, "the house".

Stef stood and pulled Callie up from the sand. "I don't know. I was sort of feeling like a walk along the beach before we go. You want to join me?"

"You sure?" Callie stood in front of the blonde. "I mean, I'm sure you should probably check on the others."

"Already done. Brandon was the one who called. They are fine."

"Lena stood behind Callie and pulled out her own phone. "Why don't you two start walking, and I'll give Brandon a call back and have them meet us somewhere for lunch in an hour?"

Stef smiled and nodded as she pulled the girl away.

~*THE FOSTERS*~

As they got closer to the water, Callie stopped, watching how calm the sea looked. She closed her eyes and just breathed the salty air. A calm had settled over her, a welcome change from the anxiety and loss she'd been feeling.

She still wasn't sure what to do about that.

"Hey," Stef said as she came up behind Callie and wrapped her arms around the teen. "I said walk, not stand and stare." Stef took Callie's hand. "Come on."

Stef pulled the girl down to the water's edge, playfully kicking at one of the waves.

Callie grinned as she watched Stef walk through the ebbing tide. In so many ways, Stef was so much like her mother. She could see Colleen in Stef's playful side, but also in her disciplinary skills. Donald did his fair share of yelling and grounding, but Colleen was the mom. You didn't cross mom.

She saw Colleen in Lena, too. The way she wanted to have Callie close nearly all the time; her ability to love infinitely. The way she hopes that Callie would open up to her one day and not stay so guarded all the time.

That made Callie check herself. She'd been guarded with her mother nearly all the time, and yet, she didn't feel the need to be as guarded with these women. A part of her wondered if maybe she'd been born into the wrong family to begin with. She always felt the need to keep her birth mother at arms' length, but Stef and Lena had found a way to get her to bend her elbows.

"All set," Lena proclaimed as she came up beside Callie and wrapped an arm around her shoulder. "We're going to meet everyone at Guido's Pizza Palace for lunch in an hour and a half." She looked at Callie. "You okay with that?"

"Yeah," Callie said as she began walking after Stef, smiling. "That sounds great."


	5. Chapter 5

**Author's Note: Thank you, once again, for everyone who's posted reviews, favorited, or followed this story. I apologize that the updates are so sporadic. I work full time and picked up a part-time job also so I can have some "stupid" money (money I can be stupid with…within reason, lol), but that is going away REALLY soon, so I'll actually be able to write a bit more. In the end, I gained "stupid" money, but lost "me" time.**

 **As always, we begin the chapter with the disclaimer: I don't own The Fosters; I don't own ABC Family; I only own the writer's block that's taken residence in my Muse's tiny apartment. (sigh)**

* * *

Chapter 5

He sat between Jesus and Brandon, Mariana across from him. He watched the door to the pizza place like a hawk, looking for any sign of his two moms and his sister.

Jude knew that something had been wrong with Callie for a while now, but it was hard for him to discern what. He felt like she purposely kept trying to keep things from him, but he wasn't a scared little kid anymore. It was the reason that waking up and finding out that Callie had gone missing – again – wasn't exactly the best way to start the day. There was a part of him that wanted to yell at her – he won't lie.

Probably will.

The other part just wanted some answers. He wasn't a little kid anymore, and he would be ecstatic if she ever stopped treating him like he was. Why did she have to take off again? Why can't she just talk to someone? And she went to their mother's grave? Why did she go alone? Why didn't she take him?

The glass door opened, and Lena walked in, closely followed by Stef and Callie, but he felt a smile creep across his face as two of the three walked in nearly drenched.

"What happened?" Jude asked, a smirk firmly in place on his face, his earlier anger beginning to ebb.

Callie narrowed her gaze at him and pointed into his face. "Your mothers happened."

Jude threw her a shocked look. "My _mothers?_ As in plural?"

"Well, maybe not plural…"

"Stef?"

"No, _Lena_."

If Mariana's head had snapped around any faster, she would've gotten whiplash. "Wait, hold up. _Mama?!_ "

"Yes, her."

"Mama…the vice principal; freakishly nutty about keeping things clean and organized… _that_ Mama?"

"The one and the same."

"What'd she do?!"

"What'd she who do?" Lena asked as she and Stef joined the kids around the table.

Callie threw Lena a semi-playful glance. "Nothing."

"Somehow, I doubt that." Stef laced her fingers in the teen's hair, brushing a few stray strands out of the girl's face.

Mariana, though, came to her sister's rescue. "Seriously, it's nothing," she looked over to Callie, "but I want a story later."

Callie let out a small laugh, "Deal."

Jude watched his sister for a few minutes. He still wanted his answers, but right now, she looked...relaxed? She didn't look like the world was going to crush her, at least, so he let it go.

…for now.

~*THE FOSTERS*~

 _Her eyes snapped open; she couldn't catch a breath. In fact, she couldn't breathe at all! Why was her chest not taking in air?_

 _She tried to open her mouth and call out for help, but she was completely paralyzed. What happened?! Why couldn't she move her face? Why couldn't she move_ anything _?!_

 _God, her chest hurt. Why couldn't she breathe?_

 _Was this a heart attack?_

 _Her eyes swept the room, but saw nothing – saw no one. Where was Mariana? She was usually close by, hanging out on her bed, doing something on her phone, or typing away on social media with her computer. Where was she?_

 _She moved her eyes to the door. The lights in the house were out, and the hallway was dark. She couldn't hear anything or anyone in the house._

 _GOD, her chest hurt! Why couldn't she breathe?!_

 _Where were Stef and Lena? Aren't they supposed to have some kind of sixth sense when one of their kids was in trouble?_

This certainly counts, _Callie thought to herself as tears began rolling down her cheek. All she wanted was her moms. She hurt, and she couldn't move. She wanted to scream, but all she could do was blink._

Her eyes snapped open, and for a brief moment, she couldn't catch her breath. However, as time continued on, her breathing evened out.

She stood slowly, as her legs were suddenly shaky. She swore Jell-o had more solidarity than the muscles in her legs at that moment.

A soft thud sounded below her. She looked down and saw the book she'd been reading.

A knock sounded on the door, and Stef's head peeked in.

"Oh, good," she started as she opened the door and fully came in the room, "you're up. I was about to wake you for dinner. You slept most of the afternoon." Stef stopped and looked Callie in the eye. "You all right, Love?"

Callie nodded slightly before shrugging her shoulders. "I guess I'm still a bit tired."

"You sure? You look a little pale." When she nodded, Stef threw her an unsure look but thankfully didn't push the matter any further. "Okay…Mama's got dinner ready."

Callie headed downstairs to the kitchen where Lena was putting the last of dinner on the table, reaching over Jude's head. She looked up and over as Callie entered the kitchen.

"Hey, Sweetheart," she said as she took her seat on the end, "how did you sleep?"

 _Like shit…_

"Okay, I guess," Callie answered as she took her place beside her brother.

"You guess?" Jude asked as he served himself some vegetables.

"Yeah. It's weird for me to be asleep in the middle of the day." Callie took a few vegetables onto her plate. "My body's just not used to it."

"Well, you must have needed it," Lena commented. "You've been sleeping most of the afternoon."

"In her defense, though," Mariana spoke up, "she was up really early this morning."

"This is also true."

"So, what are everyone's plans for tonight?" Stef asked the rest of the group, and Callie immediately began breathing a bit easier, the attention now on a more public nature.

~*THE FOSTERS*~

"Did you see how pale she was?" Lena put lotion on her legs before pulling on her pajama pants.

"I know," Stef answered, crawling into her side of the bed, "but she says she's okay – just tired."

"And you believe her?"

"Not in the slightest, but what do you want to do, Lena? Corner her until she tells us what's wrong?" She pulled Lena into her arms as the woman climbed into her side of the bed. "We all know how well that actually works…particularly with her."

Lena let out a sigh. She knew Callie wouldn't exactly be forthcoming with anything that was wrong, even though she could say from experience that it was best to just get it out of her system. Her constant argument was that she didn't want to be a burden – a worry.

"Oh, the irony," Lena sighed as she snuggled into Stef's arms.

"What?"

"Hm?" Lena momentarily looked up at her wife. "Oh, just that Callie never wants to cause us to worry, but in trying to lessen our worry, she actually causes more."

Stef, like her wife had a few moments ago, let out a sigh. "Yeah, but that's Callie. If she acted any differently, we'd think there was something wrong."

"Yeah; I guess that's true." Lena looked at Stef. "Do you think that will ever change?"

That was an excellent question. The blonde shifted slightly to look at her brunette wife. "I don't know, Love. Maybe one day."

Lena settled back onto Stef's shoulder. "It's frustrating, you know…knowing she needs something but not getting her to talk about what."

Stef began gently rubbing Lena's arm. "She will, Babe. She will."

"To you, maybe."

Stef pulled back again, looking down at her wife. "What does _that_ mean?"

Lena leaned back, looking into Stef's concerned gaze. "I'm not trying to upset you, Honey. I just mean that when she needs to – and finally does – talk, she automatically goes to you. That's all." As she said the last part, she put her head back down onto Stef's shoulder.

"Oh, my Love." Stef squeezed Lena slightly, holding her close. "She will come to you when she's ready."

"I just wish I didn't feel like I was failing her somehow."

"Baby, you're not failing her."

Lena sat up and looked at her wife. "Then what am I doing wrong?"

Stef sat up a bit, re-positioning herself against her pillows. "You're not doing anything wrong, Lena." The blonde shrugged. "I think she just feels the need to…I don't know…protect you, maybe?"

" _Protect_ me? Protect me from what?"

Stef sat up, mirroring her wife's position. "Love, she's lived in a horrible reality for so long. You're close with Jude, and she's spent the better part of the last six years protecting him. I think, on some level, she's grouped you in with him, which means that, in her mind, you need to be protected from the harsh and horrible demons of this world." She reached out and took Lena's hands into her own. "Once she sees that you are stronger than she thinks, she'll begin opening up to you more."

Lena threw her a doubtful look. "You really think so?"

"I really do." Stef shifted back under her covers and reached out to pull Lena back into her arms.

"Maybe I can take her out to do something next weekend. Kind of a way to celebrate her first weekend as an official part of our family."

"I think that sounds like a fantastic idea." Stef smiled as she kissed the top of Lena's head. "Now, let's get some sleep. Soon enough, Sunday will be here, and we're going to have a house full of teenagers needing our attention."

The brunette smiled as she went back into her wife's arms. "Yeah, but only in the morning," she said as she smirked into a kiss.

Stef kissed her wife back, "Is that so?"

"Mmhmm…" Lena pulled back. "Brandon and Lou are rehearsing for a few hours; Jude and Connor are going to a movie, and then meeting up with Connor's uncle for dinner; Mariana is hanging out with Tia at the mall; and Callie works at three. Jesus is still away at boarding school, so we'll have at least two kid-free hours."

"Yes, well, Callie's only working tomorrow if she's looking better. If she's as pale as she was at dinner, that girl is going nowhere."

Lena reached over Stef and turned out her bedside light before rolling over and turning her own off, plunging the room into darkness.

"You know what?" she said softly.

"What?"

"Enough kid-talk." Lena climbed onto her wife's lap and began kissing her sweet spots along her neck. "We need to talk about 'other stuff'."

"Mmm…yeah?" Stef groaned slightly as she pulled Lena closer to her and grinned impishly. "Like what?"

~*THE FOSTERS*~

"Yeah, okay. I'll be there as soon as I can." Callie tried to stay as quiet as she could as she hung up her phone and practically stumbled her way into the bathroom to shower. Not a Burger Stand called with two morning cancellations, and she was given the opportunity to work extra hours, but it meant she was working a double shift – breakfast through dinner.

She was ready in record time, and as she quietly made her way down the stairs, she came face-to-face with her brother.

"You're leaving again?" he whispered to her accusingly.

"I'm going to work, Jude," she answered him as she made her way to the kitchen to leave the moms a note.

"You don't work until three."

"I got called in. It happens, Jude." She stuck her note to the refrigerator door and began heading toward the front door.

"You keep on doing this!"

"Doing what?! What am I doing, Jude, other than going to work?"

"Why can't you just tell me the truth?"

"Tell you the truth about what?"

"Where you're really going!"

"I already told you, and keep your voice down before you wake someone up!" She opened the front door. "I have to go. I'll be home later. I promise." With that, she began walking down the street.

When she was a few houses away, she turned back around and looked at the house. She'd seen the house many times before, but this time, there was almost something mystical about it. She turned back around and began walking once again, but one thing plagued her mind:

Why did it feel like she just said goodbye?

* * *

 **Author's Note 2: Okay, I think I got this thing back on track, though, I'm not too sure on this particular chapter. Let me know what you think!**


	6. Chapter 6

**A/N: Here is chapter 6! Thank you for all the new follows, favorites, and reviews! Some new characters are coming your way!**

 **Disclaimer: The Fosters: Not mine. FreeForm: Not mine. New Characters mentioned: Mine.**

* * *

Chapter 6

Stef and Lena both lay in bed, debating internally who was going to get up and check out the commotion at 6am. The little spat didn't wake them, at least, but

"I'll go," Stef said softly as she climbed out of her bed slowly and made her way out the door.

She quietly made her way downstairs. She spotted Jude sitting on the couch in the living room, staring at a blank TV screen, his arms crossed, and an angry expression pressed on his face.

Stef made her way over to the young boy and sat beside him, mimicking his posture.

"You wanna tell me what's going on?" she asked him in hopes she wouldn't have to pry.

"Nothing," was his short, clipped answer.

She was going to have to pry. She sent up a silent prayer that this one wasn't going to pick up the silent habit his sister had.

"Really? 'Nothing' is the reason you are up at the crack of dawn, arguing with your sister? 'Nothing' is the reason you're sitting here, angry enough to burn a hole through our television?" She turned to him slightly. "That's what you're going with?"

"Yup."

"Ho-kay." Stef turned back front, once again mimicking his posture.

After a few moments, he turned to Stef and looked her in the eye.

Stef caught his look and gave him her full attention.

"Is Callie okay?" he asked in nearly a whisper. His tone made her heart ache.

"Your sister is going to be fine," she answered him as she pulled him into her arms. "Mama and I are watching her, and she's got you, and Mariana, and Brandon, looking out for her and loving her." She began running her fingers through the boy's hair. "With all that love surrounding her, she will be fine."

"And if she's not?"

"Callie's adoption is in four days. Mama and I are both confident that things will settle down shortly after that."

Jude sat up and looked at his mom. "And what if she's not, even after the adoption? What if she gets worse?"

Stef closed her eyes for a moment, clearing the thoughts from her head. This had been a concern of hers and Lena's, but neither wanted to think about it.

"Jude, Baby, you can't think like that; you can't." She held him a bit closer. "If your sister gets worse, Mama and I will get her whatever help she needs."

"You won't send her away?"

Stef thought for a moment before turning and pushing him into a sitting position.

"Baby, I want to ask you something." She waited until she had his full attention. "When you were so God-awful sick last month, what did we do?"

"But that's different…"

She held up her hand to silence him. "What did we do?"

"Took me to the hospital."

"Mmhmm. Did we just leave you there?"

"No."

"What did we do?"

"You stayed with me, or Mama…"

"Did we send you back?"

"No, but Callie is different," Jude insisted.

"So you've said." Stef leaned her arm on the back of the Sofa, holding her head on her fist. "Why do you think it's different?"

"She's not sick."

"Why not?"

He thought a moment. "She doesn't have a fever, for one. She isn't throwing up, and she doesn't have chills like I did."

"You're right; she doesn't have any of those symptoms. However, Mama was sick a few weeks before you, and she didn't have any of those symptoms."

"But she had a cough and stuffy nose and a headache."

"She was still sick, though, right?"

"Right…"

"So, do you think it's safe to say that illnesses can have different symptoms?"

"I guess so, but Callie…"

"Callie is the same, Love. She has an illness; it's just not physical, like yours and Mama's were."

"Can it be cured?"

Stef had to think about how to phrase that answer. It was one thing to say "Yes, it can be cured," but she knew that with depression and anxiety, the answer was never black and white. "With time, patience, and love, I think it can be made better. I don't think it can ever be completely cured." She reached out and took his hand. "We all need to be watchful and patient, so if you see anything, or hear her say anything that makes you uneasy, it's important to let either Mama or me know, all right?"

He nodded. "What if that doesn't work?"

"Do you remember what I told you when we found out that Brandon and Callie kissed?"

Jude looked at her, a worried look in his eyes. "When she went to a group home?"

"The night before the trial before she went to Girls United, yes. The night you came outside to Mama and me and apologized for not saying something about it. Do you remember what I said?"

"That you weren't giving up on either one of us."

"Exactly. If any measure Mama and I take doesn't work, then we will keep trying until we find something that does." She gave his hand a slight squeeze. "Unfortunately, what I think is going on with your sister isn't an exact science, Bud, but we are going to do everything we can." Stef watched him for a minute, making sure he understood. When she smiled slightly, she nodded at him before looking up at the clock. "Where did she go, anyway?"

He shrugged slightly. "She said she had to go to work."

"So early?" Stef looked closer at the clock. "I thought she worked this afternoon."

"She does." Jude threw her a pointed look. "She said they needed help for breakfast."

Stef's brow creased slightly as she pulled her phone out of her pajama pants pocket. She opened it and pulled up Not A Burger Stand's phone number before hitting send.

"Not A Burger Stand; this is Joe. May I help you?" came a rushed voice on the other line.

"Hi, Joe. It's Stef Adams Foster. May I speak to Callie for a moment, please?"

"Of course," Joe answered as he muffled the receiver and called to Callie.

After a few seconds, Callie's voice came on the line, "Hello?"

"Hi, Love," Stef greeted her. "I just wanted to be sure that you made it all right. Jude was a bit worried." She stuck her tongue out at Jude's narrowed gaze that he threw her.

"Yeah," Callie said softly. "He seemed pretty upset with me this morning for having to leave."

"We know. Lena and I heard you two. Well, as long as you made it all right."

"I did."

"Great, Love. Would you put your manager back on, please?"

"Yeah, sure." There was a slight pause, and Joe's voice came back.

"Hello?"

"Hi, Joe. Sorry to bug you, but what about Callie's schedule this afternoon?"

"She still needs to work her shift, or at least part of it. I'm not having her stay past ten-thirty for the Breakfast rush. I wouldn't need her back until three-thirty, and then have her close as scheduled."

"She's still a minor, Joe. She can't work more than eight hours on a day with no school; you know that."

"I know, but I need her to close. She's one of the best that I have."

"Then she needs to start later."

Joe let out a sigh. "You're putting me in a bind, here, Mrs. Adams Foster…"

"Joe, she's a minor, and she is only allowed to work a certain number of hours. That doesn't change because you're in a bind. I'm sorry. She starts at four-thirty, and I will be there to pick her up at eight, no later."

"Okay. I can do that."

"Great. Oh, and would you do me a favor and let Callie know I'll pick her up at ten-thirty, too."

"Sure, will."

"Thanks, Joe. See you in a few hours."

"Have a good day." The call disconnected, and Stef turned back to Jude.

"She's at work, Bud, and she's fine. Now, why don't you go back upstairs and get a little more sleep while I see what Mama's doing up so early on a Sunday."

Jude nodded before getting up and heading back upstairs while Stef began making her way into the kitchen.

~*THE FOSTERS*~

After Stef hadn't come back to bed, Lena ventured downstairs looking for her wife, as well as checking on Jude. At the bottom of the stairs, she saw her wife in the living room, talking to the young teen, so rather than interrupt, she quietly made her way into the kitchen and started a pot of coffee.

She smiled as she got two mugs off of the shelf and placed them on the kitchen island. She loved seeing her wife in what she called "Mommy-mode." It made the blonde seem more like a mom, and less like a security officer.

After a few minutes, the coffee was finished brewing, and Lena began pouring the bitter liquid into the two cups. She glanced into the living room, and watched as her son headed toward the stairs, and her wife made her way to the kitchen.

"Mm..." Stef said as she sat down at the kitchen island. "Coffee..."

Lena smiled as she poured herself a cup and sat across the corner from her wife. "It's the only way to your heart," she said jokingly and smirked into her cup.

"Well," Stef smirked back, "one of them, anyway."

Lena motioned with her head to the stairs. "Bubba okay?"

Stef took a long sip of her steaming cup. "Yeah," she said with a slight sigh. "He's just worried about Callie - like we all are."

Lena nodded her head in understanding. This wasn't easy for either of the mothers; she couldn't imagine how difficult it must be for Jude, watching his sister go through whatever this was.

Stef reached out and took one of Lena's hands, almost seeming to read into the brunette's thoughts. "At least he's talking about it, Love. He's not holding it in." She took another sip. "Now, if we could only get his sister to do that."

Lena nodded as she also took another sip of the steaming liquid. "Speaking of our older girl, her bed is empty again."

Stef swallowed her swig of coffee and looked her wife in the eye. "She's at work. I called and checked. Apparently, they needed extra help this morning."

"What about her shift tonight?"

"She's still working her shift-"

"She's working all day?" Lena interrupted. "Stef, that's too much!"

"Love, she's not working all day," Stef was quick to reassure her wife. "She's working until ten-thirty, at which time, I will pick her up and bring her home. She will go back in at four-thirty, and I'll pick her up tonight at eight."

"You confirmed this with her boss?" Callie was too much like Stef in this regard, Lena knew. If someone needed help, she'd be the first one to give it - never mind that it would run her into the ground.

"Yes, Love. He is aware of it, and so is she."

"Okay." Lena let out a slightly disappointed sigh. "I really wanted to spend some time with her this morning, too."

Stef smiled sympathetically. "I'm sorry, my love." Her eyes grew wide as she sat up a bit straighter. "Tell you what...why don't we get everyone up and go visit her for breakfast? We can hang out on the nearby beach afterwards. Make it a family day."

Lena smiled. "That sounds like a fantastic idea."

~*THE FOSTERS*~

Callie saw the SUV before she saw her family. She'd recognize that vehicle anywhere, and it never failed to bring a smile to her face.

"You're smiling like a goof," Trina, a new-hire at the burger stand, said with a smile.

"Huh?" Callie said as she went back to wiping the table down.

"That car pulled in, and you started smiling. You know them?"

"Um, yeah. They're my family." She went to the counter and waited for them to come through the door, ignoring the stupefied look on Trina's face.

"Hey, Love," Stef exclaimed as she opened the door to let the Adams Foster clan through the door.

"Hi," Callie said as she came around to the front of the counter, greeting her brothers and sister. "What are you all doing here?"

"Well," Lena started as she wrapped her arms around the teen, "we came to eat breakfast, and then we're heading to the beach for the day."

"Oh." Callie went back behind the counter and stood at the register. "What can we get you?"

The family ordered and made their way out to the tables to wait for their food to be prepared. Callie took the food to her family and sat down.

"So, you all just missed the excitement," she started as she sat next to Stef.

"Oh?" Lena asked as she took a bite of her breakfast. "What happened?"

"There was a guy who came in here with his family. They ordered breakfast and sat down, and I guess the little girl spilled her orange juice on the father's breakfast. He went ballistic on her."

"What?" Stef raised her eyebrows. "Was anything done?"

"Yeah. Joe had me call SDPD." The teenager looked over at her blonde mother. "He wasn't happy about that."

Stef nodded, motioning with her eyes that she was looking for more information.

Callie rolled her eyes slightly, smirking at her mom. "I'm sure you'll get all the gory details at work on Monday."

Again, Stef raised her eyebrows.

Callie pulled back slightly. "Stop looking at me like that!" Stef said nothing, but continued looking at her daughter. "Mike was the officer who responded. There, happy?"

Stef smirked as she turned back to her food. "I don't know what you're talking about."

"Stef," Lena said through a small laugh, "stop tormenting the child."

The blonde threw her wife an innocent look. "Why?"

"Hey, Cal?" came a voice from the counter. When Callie turned around, she saw Joe standing there, waving her over. She excused herself, got up, and approached her manager. "Daphne got finished with whatever she had going today a bit early and said she could cover the closing shift, starting at two. Since you were here at six this morning, can you work until two-thirty, and then you'll be finished for the day?"

"Uh, let me check with my moms, but I'm sure it will be okay." Callie walked back over to the table, asking about the time change.

"It's fine by us," Lena answered after receiving a nod from Stef. "Tell you what…I'll pick you up at two-thirty, and we'll go spend the afternoon together. What do you say?"

"Yeah, okay," Callie answered, playing it off as though it wasn't that big a deal. Secretly, though, she was excited. Each of her almost-siblings had raved about afternoons with Lena, and she really wanted some time with her; she just didn't want to ask for it. "Sounds great."

* * *

 **So, an afternoon with Mama. Hmm…what could be in store? You get to tell me! In a review, or a PM, tell me what you think Callie and Lena should do.**


	7. Chapter 7

**Author's Note: Hey, all. So, how about that finale?! Finally got a meaningful Lena/Callie moment (albeit with Brandon, but there just the same), and it lasted for all of 30 seconds (guess-timating). But it was there!**

 **Anyway, enough of the note. Here's the next installment of Life Saver.**

* * *

Chapter 7

Lena leaned back in the car, scrolling through something on her phone, while she sat waiting for her daughter. She was early, she knew, but had she stayed at the house any longer, she wouldn't have been on time. It never failed that Mariana would need something from her as she's picking up her purse and walking out the door, and Lena, being Lena, would stop and see if what the girl needed so desperately that she didn't need a minute before could be fulfilled before she left, or if her wife would have to intervene.

Stef had intervened, thankfully, before Mariana could even get her request out with the faux kicked-puppy look at Mariana's inability to come to her in times of crisis. Lena could only smirk and shake her head at the pair, while watching Stef shepherd their daughter upstairs before letting out a slight giggle at her wife's antics and walking out the door.

Her phone pinged. She opened the text message from Mariana.

 _Save me._

 _From what?_ Lena replied, smiling.

 _Your wife… :-P_

 _What's going on that you need saving from YOUR MOTHER?_

 _She is insisting on shopping with me._

 _Oh, poor baby. :-P_

 _You hate me. :_

 _Love you, too, Baby. 3_

A knock came on the window, and Lena unlocked the door, smiling as Callie got in.

She sat back in her seat and let out a sigh.

"You all right, Babe?" Lena asked, reaching over to push a few stray strands of hair behind her daughter's ear.

"Yeah." Callie turned and looked over at Lena, and the mother saw the tiredness in her eyes. "Long day." She pulled down on her shirt, looking at the front of it. "And I smell like burgers."

Lena let out a small laugh as she turned front and started the car. "I won't argue with you there. Why don't we go home first so you can shower and change out of that?"

"I love you."

Lena smiled. "I love you, too."

They arrived home to an empty house fifteen minutes later.

"Where is everyone?" Callie asked as she and Lena made their way upstairs.

Lena leaned against the wall across the hall from the girls' room. "Stef took Mariana shopping for a new bathing suit; the boys are all headed to the beach, where Mariana and Stef will meet up with them."

"What about us? Are we meeting up with them?"

"Not right away, no." Lena smiled. "We're doing something, just the two of us. We'll meet up with them later for dinner." She turned the girl around. "Go get a shower and changed. I'll be in my room; yell when you're ready."

"Really?" Callie asked in mock astonishment. "Yell? Lena, the Queen of Quiet, is saying to yell?"

"Go, before we run out of time." Lena gave Callie a gentle push toward her bedroom. Callie turned and smirked as she stuck her tongue out at the brunette and closed her bedroom door.

Lena made her way into her room. She settled against her headboard and opened a text message to her wife.

 _Your daughter is impossible._

 _I know._

*~THE FOSTERS~*

"Okay, I'll bite," Callie asked as she and Lena pulled up in front of the mall's scuba and Snorkel shop, "we're going scuba diving?"

"Not quite," Lena answered as she got out of the car and locked it. "We're getting snorkeling gear."

"I'm sorry, snorkeling?"

"Yes, snorkeling." Lena slung her arm around the teen's shoulders. "Have you ever been?"

"No, I haven't, actually. Is it fun?"

"I like to think so, but it's been so long since I've gone, I don't know where the gear is anymore." Lena pulled back, winking slightly. "And we can get a set for you now, too."

Callie couldn't help but smile. Truth be told, Callie would probably smile if Lena told her they were going for a walk in the park – as mundane an activity as you can get, according to the teen. It had been far too long since anyone had wanted to spend time with her enough that they actually planned an afternoon – random mom-time with Stef not included.

"Okay."

They looked around and shopped for about fifteen minutes before Lena finally decided on the gear they would need to go snorkeling. While she was paying at the register, Callie ventured out the back entrance that opened up into the mall and over to a food kiosk to purchase a bottled water.

"You!" The timbre of the voice made Callie stop in her tracks and turn around. There was a man, middle aged with dark hair and a beet-red face heading her way. She recognized him as the man from this morning, and he was not happy in the least.

He hurriedly stomped over to her and reached out for her arm. Callie backed up a few steps, but he still caught her upper arm, making her drop her water bottle. "You called the police on me!"

"I…" Callie was stunned. She turned her head, looking for anyone around to help her. "I was only—"

"How dare you?!" He pulled her closer, his strong fingers digging into her arm.

"Sir, please let go." Callie winced in pain as she tried to twist her way out of his grip.

"Oh, that hurts?" The man's grip tightened. "Do you know what kind of grief you caused me this morning?!"

"Ah!" she exclaimed as she felt herself being ripped from his grasp and a mess of brunette curls appeared in her line of vision.

"Hands off!" Lena demanded as she pulled Callie behind her. Callie was stunned. She'd never heard Lena use a tone like that. It almost made Callie afraid of the slender woman…almost.

Callie always had her two moms in two separate categories. Stef was the one who had the fiery side to her, the one who protected everyone. Lena was the docile one, calm and collected; Jude-like. She was Jude-like; Callie protected her, not the other way around.

"Stay out of this, Lady," the man seethed. "This don't concern you."

"It most certainly does if you are attacking my daughter. Now, back off!" Lena backed the two of them further away from the man.

But she's…

"There a problem here?"

Callie turned her head and saw two security officers standing nearby, one beside Lena and one beside the dark-haired man, who continued to glare at the teen.

"She needs to watch her back," he threatened, reaching out to try and grasp the teen's arm again.

"Do _not_ threaten my family." Lena knocked his hand away and backed Callie up even further than she had initially.

"That's not a threat!"

With that said, one of the security officers began leading the man away, making him move toward the exit while the other turned to the two women.

"Are you and your daughter all right?" he asked as he took in the pair.

Callie just stared where the man had been taken away as Lena answered, "Yeah, we'll be okay. Thank you." Whatever the conversation was after that got lost in the jumble that had become Callie's thoughts.

She wasn't even aware that anyone was talking to her until Lena had cupped her face in her hands and kissed her forehead. "You all right, Sweetheart?"

 _Was she?_ Callie lifted her gaze slightly to look Lena in the eye. He certainly had her shaken – possibly the most shaken she's been since Pearson pulled a gun on her and her brother months ago, though she'd never admit to that at the time.

She felt herself being pulled into Lena's arms. "You're okay, Baby," she whispered into her daughter's ear as she rubbed her back and peppered her temple with kisses. After a moment, she pulled back and looked the teen in the eyes. "Do you want to just go home? We can watch some movies, and…"

"No." Callie surprised herself with how clipped that answer came out. Taking a deep breath to calm her nerves, she continued, "No. I still want to go." She looked up at the brunette's uneasy expression and smirked as best as she could. "Besides, do you really want to get Stef riled up about this?"

Lena smiled back at the girl. "Good point." She took her bag from the cashier that had brought the purchase out to her with one hand while she slung her other arm around the teen's shoulders, effectively locking her against her body. "Let's get out of here."

*~THE FOSTERS~*

Lena walked the two of them out the door to the parking lot. Seeing that man going after her daughter had awakened something inside her – something she never even knew was there. Had her personality not stopped her (and the fact that her wife was a cop), it was entirely possible that she would have decked the guy for touching her child. She surprised even herself.

Callie had gotten quiet, too. That was something Lena wasn't accustomed to seeing. Callie was usually the one who went into protective mode, but when the guy had come close, she seemed to freeze, almost as though she was expecting the man to hit her, and she was bracing herself to take it.

She'd have to talk to Stef about that.

As they stepped down from the sidewalk, Lena heard an engine gun and a set of tires squeal. She looked to her right and saw a black sports car racing toward them. It was all she could do to pull Callie and herself out of the way before the tires squealed again and the car stopped. The window on the driver's side rolled down, and Lena pulled Callie behind her.

"Next time," the man's voice came from inside the car, "I won't miss." The tires squealed once again, and the car drove out of the parking lot.

Once the car was gone, Lena turned to Callie and saw that the girl was visibly shaking.

"It's okay," she tried to soothe the teen as she took the girl into her arms and held her. "You're okay. We're okay." She ran her hand up and down Callie's back, trying to convince herself of that fact as well as calm the girl's tremors.

After a moment more, she pulled back a bit and looked Callie in the eye. "You okay, Baby?"

"Yeah," she answered tremulously as she looked up at Lena. "Yeah, I'm okay. I'm fine."

On a sigh, Lena ran her hand through her curls.

"Let's just head home," she said, defeated. "Stef really needs to know about this." She takes a hold of Callie's hand and begins heading toward their car.

"No." Callie pulled Lena back, stopping her trek. "Please. I want to go snorkeling."

"Honey, that man nearly ran you over," Lena tried to reason with her. "I can't just ignore that!"

"I'm not asking you to ignore it," Callie argued back. "I'm asking you to postpone saying anything."

"Callie…"

"I've never been snorkeling, and I really, _really_ , want to go. We've already let him take nearly an hour from us. Let's just go, and we can tell Stef later."

Lena closed her eyes, trying to calm her own heightened emotions.

"Honey, I…"

"Mama…"

Lena's gaze snapped to the teen's, her breath catching in her throat.

"Please?"

After a few moments, Lena let out a sigh and nodded. "All right. All right. We'll tell Stef later."

Callie smiled slightly as she took Lena's hand once again. "Mom."

"Hm?"

"We'll tell Mom later."

Lena smiled as she wrapped her arm around the girl and left a kiss on her temple as they began heading toward the car. "Right. We'll tell Mom later."

Once they were at the car, they put the new bags in the back seat and got in, ready to go. Lena put the key in the ignition and turned it, but all the car did was crank. Confused, Lena tried again, but ended up with the same result.

"What's wrong?" Callie asked.

"I don't know," Lena answered as she tried again. Still nothing. "Mom just had this thing in the shop last week." After a fourth failed attempt to start the car, she said to Callie, "Give her a call, Honey."

Callie pulled out her phone and looked up Stef's number while Lena kept trying to start the car. She could only hear half of the conversation up until the point Callie held out the phone and said, "Mom wants to talk to you."

Lena took the phone from the girl and held it up to her ear.

"Hi, Babe," she said as she sat back in her seat.

"Mom?" Stef's voice came over the receiver. "Seriously?"

"Yeah." Lena smiled, despite her frustration at her wife's SUV. "Started this afternoon."

"Wow." Lena could tell that her wife was smiling, but she quickly got back to business. "So, what's going on, Love?"

"I don't know, Stef. The SUV won't turn over."

"So Callie said. I'm leaving the house now; you're parked outside of the Scuba shop, yes?"

"Yup."

"Okay. I'll call Triple A on my way over, and wait for them. You two take the Toyota, okay?"

"All right."

"Everything else all right, Love? You sound a little too upset just for a car that won't start."

Lena couldn't help but smile at her wife's intuition. "We'll talk when you get here."

"Everything okay with Callie?"

"Love, we'll talk when you get here."

"Lena…"

"Stef, I don't want to talk about it over the phone. Call Triple A, and we'll see you in a little bit."

"All right. Love you."

"Love you, too."

"Mom's on her way," Lena said as she hung up the phone and handed it back to Callie, who put it back in her shorts pocket. She sat back in the seat, opening her door to let the slight breeze through. "Honey, open your door, and we'll create a nice cross-breeze." Once Callie did as she was told, Lena watched her for a moment. The teen seemed to be lost in her own thoughts. "Whatcha thinking about, Babe?"

Callie only looked back over at her mother. "Oh, nothing of substance." At Lena's disappointed look, she continued, "I wouldn't want to bore you."

Lena smiled at her questioningly. "Bore me."

Callie looked to the woman and smiled. "I'm just brooding..."

"About what?"

"Promise you won't get upset?"

Now, Lena was on the alert. "I can't promise that, but I can promise to try not to."

The teen let out a sigh. "I guess that'll have to do." She closed her eyes for a moment, allowing her thoughts to collect. "It's just...I should've seen this coming. Seriously."

"What do you mean?"

"My life is never that easy. Something as simple as going snorkeling just can't be that simple; there's always something that has to happen. I mean, look at my adoption..."

"Honey..."

Callie shot Lena a look that stopped the woman from saying whatever she was about to say.

"I know it's happening; I don't need that lecture again, but look at what we've had to go through to get to it. It couldn't have been as easy to just get adopted the first time around. I had to get a signature from a man I didn't even know _about_ much less could call my father, and he tried to take me away from the only family I've known since my mom died. The times I was removed from here, I was locked in a room, nearly run over by a girl's boyfriend..."

"Hold it!" Lena started, that last revelation catching her attention. "What do you mean you were nearly run over? By who?!"

Callie just waved her hand, dismissing her mother's concern. "It was a while ago while I was at GU. It's no big deal."

"Callie..."

"Really, Mama. It's over."

"You're all right?"

Callie half nodded her head slightly. "Oh, yeah, I'm fine. It shook me up at the time, but he's since been arrested on another charge, so I don't worry about it anymore, really."

"Hey, loves," came a voice from nearby.

Lena let out a sigh as she turned and got out of the car, greeting her wife with a quick peck.

"Hey," Lena answered as she let Stef get inside.

Stef turned the key in the ignition and got the same results as Lena had before sitting back.

"Huh," she said on a sigh. Stef turned her head and looked over at Callie. "Good thing I got done shopping early, huh?"

Callie only let out a smile.

Stef turned back to Lena, throwing her a questioning look before getting out and moving with her wife to the back of the SUV.

"Triple A should be on the way. They should be here in the next forty-five minutes, or so. You, uh, wanna tell me what's going on?"

It took a few minutes, but Lena recounted the events of the afternoon to her wife, trying to soften the blow as much as she could. Stef immediately went over to the passenger side of the car and opened Callie's door farther.

"Are you all right?" Stef pulled Callie into her arms and held her for a few moments before she let the girl go.

"I'm fine, Mom, really."

"Are you sure?"

"You worry too much." Callie's voice was teasing, but Lena knew the words held some truth to them. Her wife did worry too much, but in this instance, it was warranted.

"Okay, okay." Stef gently pulled a strand of the girl's hair before leaving the girl in the car and heading back over to her wife. Lena, now that her wife was there, finally allowed herself the few seconds to let her emotions show. "Lena?"

"He nearly killed her, Stef," she answered, her voice shaking.

"But he didn't."

"I know; I know, but it was just too close for my comfort." She let out a sigh.

Stef looked her wife in the eye. "What do you want to do?"

"Personally, I would just rather her spend the day at home after nearly being run down by a car, but she's insisting she's fine to go. However, with her recent bout with depression, I..." She let her fears calm a moment. "I just don't know."

"She's one resilient kid." Stef glanced between her wife and daughter. "Just use your best judgment, Love. Give it a try, and if anything seems off, bring her home."

Although nervous, Lena nodded, and she and Callie got their gear out of the back seat of the SUV and transferred it to the Toyota. Shortly after, they were heading to the docks.

* * *

 **Next chapter - Snorkeling with Lena!**

 **Thank you to everyone who is sticking with me. I'm glad you all are liking this story. :-)**


	8. Chapter 8

**Author's Note: Well, here it finally is! I'm so sorry my updating is so sporadic. My muse likes to take long vacations, and leave me with fragmented ideas. Anyway, here is Chapter 8, and I hope you enjoy! This is going to start picking up in the next few chapters, so thanks to everyone who is sticking around!**

 **CMA Legal Stuff: I don't own The Fosters; I don't own Freeform; I only own...nope, don't own that either. LOL!**

 **Enjoy!**

* * *

Chapter 8

Callie opened her eyes when she felt her arm being shaken slightly. Her eyes met Lena's smiling ones before she looked around as she stretched.

"Where are we?" She asked through a yawn.

"Sea World Marina," Lena answered her as she unbuckled her seat belt and turned to the girl. "Honey, are you sure you want to do this today, or would you rather go home to rest?"

Callie threw Lena a look. "Would _you_ rather go home?"

Lena threw a look right back at her – one that said she was treading dangerously close to the line between playfully snarky and disrespectful. "Watch your tone with me, please." She softened her features slightly. "I'm only asking because you seem really out of it, and I would rather not have you tired while we're in the water."

"Mama, honestly, I'm okay. It's just been a really long day, and I want to go snorkeling with you." Callie, slightly upset that this conversation kept coming up, got out of the car and pulled her new equipment out of the back of the Prius.

The older brunette, while still a bit skeptical, followed Callie out of the car and toward the marina. She knew someone who did research on the wildlife in the Cove and had arranged for him to take them out to where the cove met the ocean.

As the two made their way toward the docks, Callie became enamored by the number of boats that were moored there. Some were yachts; some were little speed boats; one of them had a huge mast sticking up from the center of it, and Callie found herself wondering what it would be like to go sailing, the Enya song popping into her head.

"Todd!" Lena called out as she waved her hand.

"Lena!" A man in ripped jean shorts and a t-shirt stepped off of one of the more expensive boats and wrapped his arms around Lena. "It's been too long. How are you?"

"I'm fantastic, thanks." Lena smiled as she put her arm around Callie's shoulders. "How are you?"

"Eh, you know..." Todd shrugged slightly and glanced at Callie. "Who is this?"

"This is my daughter, Callie" Lena ushered her forward as Todd held his hand out to shake the girl's, "Callie, this is Todd Kiligan. He and I went to school together."

"Pleased to meet you," Todd said as he gently shook Callie's hand.

"Hi," was all Callie managed to mutter as she shook his hand back.

Lena smiled apologetically at her old friend. "She's a bit shy around new faces."

Todd only smiled back at Lena. "It's no big deal. I seem to remember you being that way, too."

Lena rolled her eyes and smirked. "I don't know what you're talking about."

Todd let out a laugh as he stepped onto his boat and held out his hand for Lena and Callie. "Well, Ladies, shall we get this expedition under way?"

The older of the two women gently pushed the younger one forward toward where Todd was holding his hand out for her to take. Once they were on board, they were soon on their way out of the inlet and into open water.

Callie stared out into the ocean, taking in all the beauty. The sky was a bright blue with some clouds on the horizon. Sixteen years of her life, and she could honestly say she had never been out on the ocean.

"You ever driven a boat, Callie?" Todd asked as he steered the vessel over the waves.

"No, I haven't," Callie answered honestly. "I've never been in one like this."

"Really?" Lena asked incredulously. "Not even as a child?"

Callie looked her in the eye. "Nope. I mean, Robert took me out on his yacht, but we really didn't go very far."

"Wow. I thought for sure he would've allowed you to steer at least once."

"Nope."

"Do you want to try your hand at it?" Todd asked as he stopped the ship in waves that weren't as rough.

Callie threw him a surprised look. "Are you serious?"

"Absolutely."

"Don't you need a license to drive one of these?"

Todd turned to her and crossed his arms over his chest. "I don't see any cops, do you?"

"I live with one."

"Callie, go ahead," Lena jumped in. "Mom won't hear about it from me."

"What if I pull ahead too fast and you fall off?"

"I can swim." Lena smirked.

"Not funny."

"Go on. Give it a try."

Slowly, Callie stood and went to the helm. Once Todd was finished explaining what everything was for and what it did, she took the wheel into her hands and slowly began moving the boat through the water.

"Great job, Kid," the captain said as he took a seat and leaned back. "Just keep on this heading, and Lena can let you know when to turn."

"What are you going to do?"

"Me?" He pulled his ball cap down over his eyes. "I'm taking a nap."

"You can't take a nap!" Callie began sounding panicked.

Todd let out a small laugh as he propped his feet up on a bucket. "I can, too. I'm the captain. I'm allowed."

"I can't drive this thing!"

"You seem to be doing just fine. Just keep doing what you're doing, and you'll be fine."

"But..."

"Sh!" He crossed his arms and put his head down. "I'm sleeping."

Lena only laughed at the display in front of her. It had been a while since she'd hung around with Todd, and she did miss it, but Callie's panicked expression didn't go away when he pretended to fall asleep, so she went to the helm to calm the teenager down.

"Honey, he's not really taking a nap. He is the captain, and he's watching where you're going. If something happens, he will get up."

"Says who?" Came Todd's voice from the chair.

"Says me, that's who!" Lena retorted as she threw one of the towels at him, letting out another small laugh.

"So, Callie," Todd started as the conversation at the helm died down, "you excited to be swimming with sharks?"

"Wait, what?!"

*~THE FOSTERS~*

Stef sat in the driver's seat of her SUV waiting for the tow truck to arrive. Today, really just wasn't her day. She woke up to one sibling set fighting; after breakfast, Mariana got into it with Jude over something to do with Callie (neither one being inclined to tell her what was going on); Jude stormed off, Brandon following with a promise to meet at the beach. She took Mariana shopping, hoping to cool her down with a bit of retail therapy. Then, after dropping her off at the beach with her brothers, she headed home for some peace.

Not twenty minutes later, her phone rang, and the SUV was broken down in the mall parking lot, where she sat – after learning what had happened with her wife and daughter, waiting for the tow truck to show up and get her – and her truck – to the garage.

In the silence of the car, she found her thoughts drifting to what she'd been told had happened with Callie.

That was the thought going through her head when the knock came to the door.

"Hello?" A man's voice came to her. She got out and shook the man's hand before explaining what was going on with her truck, her thoughts of her son's behavior now placed in the back of her mind, along with the desire to bring it to Lena's attention, if she hadn't already noticed.

At least, for the moment...

*~THE FOSTERS~*

Callie was laying back, her eyes closed, breathing in the salty sea air as she floated on the crest of the waves. Every time her body rose and sank slightly, she allowed herself ten seconds to pretend the day before this moment didn't happen. It was often hard for Callie to just relax, but in this moment – out at sea with the Zen-queen of her house, floating just above a watery wonderland – she allowed herself to be calm, at one with the waves.

She thought back to the other night at the beach.

 _If you could float on a wave and go anywhere, where would you go?_

The teen smiled. _Right here,_ she mentally changed her previous answer.

She felt a slight shift in the waves around her.

"Hey," Lena's soft voice cut into her thoughts, "what's the smile for?"

Callie thought for a minute, contemplating her answer.

"I didn't sink," was her answer, hoping that would satisfy the elder brunette.

"Ah," Lena pulled her mask back down. "We told you that you wouldn't. You want to go down again?" Lena smiled as the teen righted herself in the water, taking the mask and snorkel that Lena held out for her. "Maybe this time, we'll find your mermaid."

The girl smiled as best as she could around her snorkel while she gave a half-shrug before putting her face down in the water.

Lena soon followed suit, and the quest for the mythical half-human-half-fish in the wonderland of water began once again.

*~THE FOSTERS~*

The coffee was stale, but drinkable. It wasn't Lena's, that was for sure, but beggars couldn't be choosers. At least, that's what Stef told herself as she took another long sip from the bitter drink and draining the cup of its contents. It wasn't like the woman didn't have other options with a Dunkin' Donuts next door and a 24-hour diner across the street, but the coffee in the tiny waiting area was free, so she suffered.

That was the last cup she could stomach, so she threw her cup away just as the mechanic on duty came back into the lobby.

"So, Dan," Stef said as she approached the counter, "what's the verdict? Will I be taking a car home?"

"Oh, yeah," Dan answered. "It was a bad fuse. Easy fix. She's good as new."

"Awesome," Stef commented as she pulled her wallet out of her purse. "How much do I owe you?"

"Nothing." Dan printed off a receipt and handed it to Stef. "Something that simple is almost insulting to charge for." When Stef went to argue, he cut her off, "Besides, the guy who looked at it last week should have caught that and didn't, so it would be on us anyway."

"Thanks, Dan."

"Sure thing." He handed Stef her key and walked her out. "Catch you later."

Stef waved bye as she started her SUV and began heading home. Something didn't seem right, though, in what Dan had said. The guy who looked at the car last week _had_ checked the fuses; she had the receipt to prove it, so how, then, did she have a bad fuse?

Her instincts were telling her something was up, and her professional training was urging her to investigate, but investigate what, exactly? Maybe it was just a fuse that was missed, but her normal mechanic is rarely that careless. She might expect that out of a new mechanic, not out of a guy who's been doing this for twenty-odd years.

Then her common sense kicked in. _Be thankful that was all it was,_ a voice told her, _considering what_ could _have happened today._

Stef pulled into her driveway and sat for a moment, not realizing she really hadn't processed the fact that her daughter was nearly run over by a car earlier today, but what got her upset was that the girl was targeted. _That_ was what she needed to investigate – not some fuse confusion.

She needed to talk to Mike.

*~THE FOSTERS~*

Today had been a good day.

That was the thought Lena had as she wrapped a towel around Callie's shoulders as their boat captain pulled their small craft back into the marina. The breeze off of the water was getting chilly, and the last thing she wanted – or needed, for that matter – was for Callie to get sick.

She rubbed her hand up and down Callie's arm, warming the teen as the young girl leaned her head down onto Lena's shoulder. Lena turned her head slightly and laid a small kiss on the teenager's hair before rubbing her cheek against the girl's crown.

These were moments she cherished with her children. Quiet ones, where she could just be at peace with them.

Once the boat was docked, Todd pulled Lena aside. He showed her a picture on his phone, which made her smile. The sunset shone brilliantly behind the duo, and that moment between mother and daughter is what the captain caught on film. The teen may have been tired – exhausted – but in that small moment, she looked at peace – much more peaceful than she did when she stepped onto the tiny research vessel.

"Oh, goodness," she gasped as she smiled. "Can you send that to me?"

"Absolutely," the captain answered as he pulled up Lena's phone number. Once she received the picture, she called it up to show Callie, but the teen had her arms rested on the back rail of the ship, her head nestled in her arms, and her eyes closed.

Lena smiled softly as she pulled up her camera on her phone and snapped a picture. As she put her phone down, she went over and gently shook the girl's arm.

"Callie?" she called softly. "Come on, Sweetheart. You've got to wake up so we can head home." Lena smiled as Callie stirred and looked up at her. "Hey, Baby." Lena helped the teen to stand. "Let's get you home."

Groggily, Callie stood and made her way onto the dock, and within a few minutes, the two were on their way home.

*~THE FOSTERS~*

Stef pulled the sheets back from her side of the bed while Lena threw her decorative pillows onto the chair beside her night stand. Once they were all on the chair, she picked up a hair tie from the night stand and pulled her mane back into a high ponytail/bun.

"You should have seen the look on her face when Todd asked her if she was excited about swimming with sharks," Lena said with a small laugh.

"That good, huh?" Stef crawled into bed, settling against her pillow on the headboard and pulling the blanket over her legs.

"I couldn't' help myself. I started laughing. She was horrified!" Lena still got the giggles when she thought about the look on Callie's face. The teenager had latched onto Lena almost immediately, scared of the idea of swimming with anything that had teeth that sharp. Only when she learned they were Leopard Sharks did she calm down. Leopard sharks, for the most part, are pretty calm.

The blonde looked at her wife in mock-astonishment. "Lena Adams Foster! You were laughing at our daughter! The poor, defenseless, baby!"

"Yeah, the poor defenseless baby who thought it was a good idea to swim right up to one and run her hand along its back!"

"She _what_?!"

"Yep. Nearly gave me a heart attack! I mean, I know Leopard Sharks are docile, but they don't like being messed with, and then, just for fun, when we dove back down for the last time before heading back to the marina, it came back to investigate her." Lena shuddered at how curious the little shark was with Callie. "I'm surprised she didn't get bitten."

"Well," Stef said as she got comfortable and closed her eyes slightly, "serves you right for laughing at her."

Lena looked at her wife and raised an eyebrow. "Oh, really?"

"Yes, really." Stef opened her eyes and saw Lena smirking down at her.

Lena leaned down slowly, caressing Stef's lips with her own before moving to sit on top of her. She slowly made her way over to Stef's left ear, smiling as she heard her wife let out a small groan followed by a shiver.

Perfect.

The brunette smirked even more. "You like that?"

"Mmhmm," Stef answered, unable to form any words.

"Good," Lena smiled and stopped what she was doing and climbed back over to her side of the bed, climbing under the covers, "because that's all you're getting."

"Ohhh, no. Come here, you!"

* * *

 **AN2: I know that what we see of the Day with Mama is kind of limited here (for what I'm trying to set up, not that much really needed to happen on the day), I am willing to plan and write the whole shebang if you're interested. Let me know in a PM or a review. If I get five requests, I'll write it.**


	9. Chapter 9

**Author's Note: Chapter 9 is here! I hope you like it. Read and Review!**

 **CMA Legaleze: Alex is mine. Everyone else? Not mine.**

* * *

Chapter 9

Monday morning came too early for most of the Adams Fosters. Lena got up and headed into the bathroom, grabbing the first shower of the day while Stef rolled out of bed to head downstairs to start breakfast. As she came down the last few steps into the kitchen, she saw Callie at the table with a book open, eating a bowl of cereal.

"Morning, Sweets," Stef said as she approached the fridge and pulled out the bucket of eggs.

Callie looked up and smiled. "Morning."

"You're up awfully early." Stef began preparing her scrambled eggs.

"I didn't see much point in staring at the ceiling for another hour." Callie turned a page in her book.

The blonde's eyebrows raised. "Oh? Why were you staring at the ceiling when you were supposed to be sleeping?"

Callie just shrugged.

"Callie, really?" Stef leveled a gaze at the teen. When the teen didn't respond, Stef went over to her and gently took the book from her hand and closed it, forcing the girl to look up. Stef actually smiled at the annoyed look that Callie gave her. "Talk to me, Love. Why couldn't you sleep?"

"I honestly don't know. I just woke up and couldn't go back to sleep."

"Nothing's on your mind?" Stef watched her daughter's face for any sign of her walls going back up.

Callie, however, just frowned slightly and shook her head. "Nope."

"You're not thinking about what happened yesterday?"

"Not really." Callie shrugged. "I don't even know why I reacted like I did. I've had foster fathers that were worse than he was, so..."

Stef sat down on the stool beside the girl, and turned the teenager so they were facing each other.

"You also haven't had to deal with that in a while, Love." Stef reached up and put a stray strand of hair behind her ear. "Just because you've dealt with that kind of treatment before doesn't mean it won't bother you now. Honestly, I'd be surprised if it didn't."

"Why?" Callie sat straight up again. "I lived for years with being threatened, beaten, and worse. You've seen my file. Why would it surprise you?"

"Because for the last nine months, Love, you haven't had to deal with it, and you've worked so hard in overcoming all of the abuse. Do you remember what you were like when you first got here?"

"When I asked if you were dykes?"

"Yes, when you asked us that. I remember a girl who was ready to fight anything and anyone to keep herself protected. This conversation..." Stef motioned between the two of them. "...never would've happened nine months ago, and now look where we are. I'm so proud that you've been able to put the abuse behind you – even got to see one of the worst ones get locked up. That's why I worry about how you're dealing with what happened yesterday."

Callie only smirked slightly and shook her head at the woman.

"You worry too much."

The blonde mother took the girl's head into her hands as she stood up and smirked back. "You don't have you for a daughter, do you?"

Callie squinted her eyes at her mother. "Your eggs are burning."

"No, they're not. The stove's not on yet."

*~THE FOSTERS~*

Lena sat at her desk, going through the referrals that were given to her. She had five students this morning that she already had to talk to – two fights and one bullying accusation. In summation, not something she needed this morning, which was why all five students were being suspended.

On some level, she knew that she should just let Monte handle them, but Monte has been in meetings with investors all morning, and this needed to be taken care of immediately. However, that didn't deter her from feeling like she should just hand them over.

What also didn't help her mood was that Callie had left the house after talking to Stef for a little bit, but much too early to get to school, and on top of it, Lena hadn't seen her on campus. She was only mildly concerned about that fact, but still concerned. Callie was usually an early riser, but it was rare when she left before the rest of the family to get to school, and even then, Callie checked in at the school.

However, so far today, she hadn't seen her sixteen-year-old daughter, and with everything that was going on with the five suspensions, she hadn't had a chance to check the attendance reports. In fact, it wasn't until her registrar came into her office that she even thought about checking the attendance to be sure that the girl had made it.

"What do you want me to put down as Callie's absence excuse?" Mary, the registrar, asked silently.

Lena had been taking a drink from her coffee at the time and nearly choked.

"Excuse me?!"

Mary looked a bit uneasy. "She's on my absence report. How do you want me to mark it? Is she sick?"

For a second, what Mary was saying didn't make any sense. Why would Callie show up on her absence report, unless…

"She should be here."

"If she is, she wasn't marked as present, and each teacher she's had so far has her marked absent."

"No," Lena said as she felt her heart rate go up. "No, she left the house this morning before all of us. She should've been here long before any of us."

"I'm sorry, Lena, but she's not here."

The brunette let out a sigh. "Okay. Uh…" Lena hated being flustered. "Mark it unexcused for now, and I'll call my wife to see if she knows where Callie is. We can always change it later, right?"

Mary nodded. "Of course." And with that, she left the frazzled mother to call her wife.

Before picking up the phone, however, she rubbed her temples, trying to stave off the headache that was beginning to intensify.

Two rings, and Stef was on the phone.

"Hi, Love," Stef's voice came through a bit more cheerily than Lena had hoped for. Now, she felt bad for having to say what she called her about.

But so be it...

"Callie's not here."

And silence engulfed the other side of the conversation.

"Come again?" The blonde cop stated with a bit of an edge to her voice.

"Callie's not here. She never made it in. Her attendance..."

"Okay, Love, you need to take a deep breath and calm down."

"Stef, she left before every one of us this morning. She should've been here _long_ before us, and none of her teachers have seen her all day, and yesterday..."

"Lena!"

Lena stopped and gulped down her fear, but that didn't stop the tear from escaping her eye.

"Listen to me, Love. Let me see if I can locate her phone, and go from there, okay?" Lena gave an affirmative answer before Stef continued, "Just sit tight, all right? I love you."

"Love you, too. Keep me posted."

"Of course." And the two of them hung up.

The next hour went by much too slowly for Lena, and by the time that Stef texted her that she found their daughter, she was ready to go down to Monte's office and take the rest of the day off to go and aid in the search. As it was, she had already reported Callie's absence to her boss, but because this was her daughter, Lena could not come up with the consequences imposed by the school.

Then the door to her office opened, and Lena breathed out a, "Thank God!" before throwing Callie a hard look, gesturing to the chair in front of her desk. "Have a seat."

Callie, for her part and despite glaring daggers at the Vice Principal, sat in the chair that her mother gestured to.

"You were aware there was school today, correct?" Lena asked as she sat back in her chair, crossing her arms, communicating to Callie that she wanted an answer. However, when all Callie did was nod, she decided to continue, "I see. Were you suddenly confused by the time that school started?"

"Nope."

So, this was going to be one of _those_ conversations. "Then why were you at a coffee shop with someone we don't know when you were supposed to be in class?"

"I know her."

"Callie..."

"What? I do!"

"Hey! Watch yourself, Callie." Lena leaned forward on her desk. "I'm not the one who was skipping school, here, and truancy aside, do you not remember what happened yesterday?"

"What..."

"You were threatened and nearly run over, remember?"

"I didn't forget!"

"Then explain to me why you would spend today anywhere but where you were supposed to be?" Now, Lena was getting angry. "I nearly had a heart attack when Mary told me you were on the absentee report. You left the house before everyone…"

"Did you even check your calendar?"

 _Huh?!_

"My calendar? Callie, there is nothing on my calendar for you today, _especially_ that involves you skipping school."

The look of shock on Callie's face was hard to miss, but the girl recovered quickly. "Are you serious? You have nothing on there about me meeting up with an old foster sister today?"

"No, I don't, and-"

"Figures..."

Is this girl _trying_ to upset Lena?

"Now, what is that supposed to mean?"

Callie looked into her lap, refusing to look Lena in the face again. "Nothing."

"No, Callie. What?"

"It's nothing. Just drop it!"

"I'm not just…"

"Well, I'm not going to tell you, so leave it be!"

Lena took a breath and closed her eyes. "Callie, this is your final warning. Check your attitude, or being grounded will be the least of your worries." She took Callie's silence as a sign of acquiescence, but the tear that escaped the teen's eyes didn't go unnoticed. "Thank you." The Vice Principal seemed to put herself into Mother-mode as she went to sit beside the girl. "I can tell something's up, Honey. You seemed okay yesterday…"

However, Callie wasn't ready to give it up. "That was yesterday."

"What happened today?"

"Nothing."

"I think you and I both know that's not true." Lena reached out to take the girl's hand but was disheartened when Callie moved away from her touch. Letting out a sigh, she leaned forward to try and look Callie in the eyes. "Help me understand this. Please?"

"What's to understand?"

"Why you're acting like this…"

"What's the point?! It's not like you're going to listen to me anyway."

Ouch.

"Callie…" Lena had to finish reeling from that. "That's not true…"

"Yes, it is." Callie took a deep breath. "Yes, it is. If you had listened to me two weeks ago, you would've known exactly where I was, and why."

"Cal…"

"No!" Callie's ire was beginning to grow. "I'm not going to tell you why I was with her, simply because you should already know. You write every other event in and of your life in your damn planner; you should have written this as well. So, I'm not going to reiterate what I told you two weeks ago when I originally asked about this, so you're just going to have to deal with it."

"All right, that's enough!" Lena's patience was beginning to run thin. "I understand you are upset, but you do not get to be disrespectful to me. Now end it, or your in-school suspension will be changed to an out-of-school suspension."

"In-school suspension?!"

"Yes—"

"For doing something that I had permission to do?!"

"Mom and I did _not_ give you permission to skip…"

"Yes, you did!"

Lena's patience was now gone. "You know what? Get to the ISS room. We'll continue this…" Callie got up and left the office, all but banging the door against the wall. To herself, Lena continued, "…once we're all a bit calmer."

*~THE FOSTERS~*

Stef knocked softly on the door to the girls' bedroom. She knew that Callie was in there, and she knew she was trying to hide from everyone, but hiding never solved any problem.

From what Lena had told her, the rest of her day went by smoothly. Despite the glares and obvious attitude from their sixteen-year-old daughter, she did what she was told and didn't really make much of a fuss.

Stef had to smile a bit when Lena told her that piece of information. The two of them really were alike. Stef could remember times in her teenage years where she would just do what she was told so her mom and dad wouldn't speak to her; she suspected that's what Callie was doing now, much to Lena's dismay.

The blonde also suspected that was why Lena had sent her up to get Callie for dinner, rather than come herself, or send one of their other children. Stef would know how to get Callie to talk – or at least, that was her theory. The truth was, when Stef was avoiding her parents like the plague, she wasn't already in a depressive state. Callie, on the other hand, was.

Slowly, she opened the door and peeked her head inside. Callie was sitting up on her bed, legs crossed underneath her, her journal open, and her hand writing furiously across the pages. She almost left the girl to her thoughts, but dinner was about to be put on the table, and the teen needed to eat.

"Hey, Callie?" Stef said quietly as she closed the door and made her way over to the bed.

"Yeah?" Callie all but grunted to her mother but didn't bother looking up from her pages.

Noticing this, Stef sat on the edge of the bed, right in front of the girl. "What are you working on?"

Continuing her feverish writing, she answered, "Homework."

"Ah." She tried to get into the girl's field of vision. "I thought you finished all of tonight's homework this past weekend."

"I did. Timothy gave me a prompt to give me something to do since I'd already finished and submitted his assignment."

"Must be some prompt." Callie's lack of eye contact started to unnerve Stef. "Can you, uh, stop for a few minutes to talk?"

Callie stopped immediately, closing her journal and setting it on the bedside table. She looked up at the blonde and stared into her eyes. "Okay."

The suddenness of it all threw Stef slightly. "Okay?"

"You want to talk; you now have my complete, undivided attention."

"I heard you and Mama got into an argument today that almost got you suspended…"

"Well, then you know the highlight of my day. Anything else?"

"Callie," Stef took a breath to collect her thoughts before continuing with, "Love, I want to have a calm conversation here. That's all. Now, I know you're upset…"

"Ya think?!"

"Mind your tone, Callie." The two had a stare-down for a moment before Stef said, "You are perfectly capable of being upset without being disrespectful."

Callie looked over to the bedside table, at the now-closed journal. "Are we done? I want to finish this."

"No, we are not finished. Talk to me, Callie…"

"About what? About how I made plans with Alex and had to abruptly stop them, or about how you guys said I could spend the day with her? Or, how about how I'm now not even able to spend any other days with her because I'm now grounded for doing what you guys said I could do in the first place?" Callie was now getting animated.

"Young lady, I will not say it again…"

"But you know what really amazes me?"

 _This is a losing battle,_ Stef thought as she took a deep breath. A part of her knew that Callie needed to calm down, but the girl was on a roll. Stef didn't want to risk stopping the rant at this point simply because she didn't want Callie to internalize all this negativity. With what had been going on the last few days, this much pent-up emotion could turn self- destructive, and neither she nor Lena wanted any of their children to feel as though that was an answer to any problem.

"Mariana wants to go to the mall, it ends up on the calendar; Jesus has a date, it ends up on the calendar. Brandon's practices? On the calendar. Jude hangs with friends? On the calendar." Callie's eyes found Stef's, but what Stef saw there wasn't anger…not really. "I make plans _two weeks in advance_ – and the two of you _approve_ – it's nowhere on the calendar. Instead, I get hauled down to the school, and I now have a truancy mark in my file, which typically enough, I can do nothing about."

"Callie…"

"What?" the girl snapped.

Stef pursed her lips and nodded slightly. "Okay. You obviously still need some time alone since you are finding it difficult to be civil. Dinner is in twenty minutes. You need to be downstairs with the family by then, and your attitude better have changed."

She stood up from the bed as Callie took the journal back, opened it, and once again began writing furiously across the page, but not without mumbling, "You're the one who came to me. No one _asked_ if I was even ready."

Stef, never being one for mumbling, turned to the girl and lifted her chin, making sure the two made eye contact. "Well, when you _are_ ready, then you know where to find us, and you better bring an apology." She let go of her chin and headed for the door.

"What would be the point? Not like you listen anyway."

 _That_ Stef chose to ignore.

She made her way back down to the kitchen where Lena was stirring something on the stove.

"How'd it go?" Lena asked as she put the lid on the pot to simmer.

"Well," Stef began as she began clearing the kitchen island, "she's definitely upset."

"That you knew going up there." Lena turned and went over to the table and sat down. "I just don't understand where all of this hostility is coming from. It's not like she's never been grounded before."

"I don't know." Stef let out a small sigh.

"So, how do we handle this? I mean, _she_ is the one who was trying to skip school…"

"…which she claims we approved of, and I have to be honest, I half-way remember the conversation."

"A conversation in which we gave our sixteen-year-old permission to skip school? Stef, really!"

"No, Lena." Stef threw Lena a look. "I remember us giving her permission to spend a Monday with her friend, but I think we were both under the impression it was next week when the kids are home. I don't think we realized it was today, and that's what spurned all of this mess."

Lena adopted a doubtful look. "I don't remember that."

Stef sat across the corner from her wife. "I do."

"Was I there?"

Stef threw her wife a look of disbelief. "Yes, you were there, and you also agreed."

"Stef, I never would've agreed to her taking a day off from school to spend it with a friend. You know that…"

"Yes, I do, but it's like I said. I don't know if we intended to. We probably thought she meant _next_ Monday…not today."

Lena looked defeated. "So, what do we do? If this is just a misunderstanding on _all_ our parts, what do we have to do to get her to at least be civil to us?"

Stef let out a sigh. "Honestly, my Love, I don't know. Maybe a compromise?"

"Such as?"

"See how she feels in the morning and get her to hear us out. Maybe she can spend some time with her friend this weekend."

"Okay, but until then, she's grounded. She doesn't have the right to treat us this way."

"Agreed."

* * *

 **Chapter 10 is already in making, and I should be able to update next week. This chapter was originally longer, but if I would've kept everything here, there'd be nothing left for Chapter 10. Haha. Thanks for reading!**


	10. Chapter 10

**Author's Note: Here it is! Chapter 10. I hope you guys don't hate me too much by the end of this. :-S Anyway, I'll say I'm sorry anyway just in case. Enjoy!**

 **CMA Legal: I don't own The Foster's; I don't own FreeForm; I own the cat sleeping on my lap, though. She's all mine.**

* * *

Chapter 10

Dinner that evening had been quiet. Callie didn't even want to go downstairs to dinner, but when Lena came in the door to retrieve her, she didn't put up a fight. She just went without comment to the kitchen and thwarted any attempt by anyone to carry on a conversation.

Once dinner was over, Callie cleaned the dishes, dried them, and put them away before heading upstairs to her room. Mariana had made herself scarce to work on homework in the lounge room, giving Callie the privacy she silently asked for.

She sat on her bed, leaning her head against her wall, journal open and forgotten beside her. Her knees were bent, but leaning lazily against the wall. Every few moments, a tear would escape her eye and run down her face. Sitting here, she'd never felt so lonely. She felt disconnected from the people she'd come to think of as her family, even though it was lost to her as to why.

Though, she'd never been _hurt_ like she had that day by this family, and a part of her brain couldn't reason why she was so hurt to begin with. Had they _purposely_ not put her day on the calendar? She doubted it, but it hurt all the same.

Another tear fell.

Her eyes wandered around the room, and despite Mariana's efforts to make space for her, every bit of Callie's presence in the room was confined to the corner where her bed sat.

Suddenly, the room felt confining. She was suffocating and needed some air, so she got up, threw on a pair of flip flops and made her way downstairs. She was grounded, she knew, but in that moment, she needed to breathe.

She journeyed downstairs, tired of the confining silence of the room. It was thirty minutes to lights out, and for that final half hour, she wanted some peace. The quiet upstairs was becoming too loud with everything that wanted to be said. She needed some solace, even if it was only for thirty minutes.

" _Now_ where are you going?" Came a voice from behind her.

 _So close!_

Callie turned around and saw her brother standing at the foot of the stairs with a small glass of milk in his hands.

"I'm just going outside for a little bit."

"Why?"

"Because I need some space."

"Space from what? You've been alone all night except for dinner."

"Yeah, sitting in a room. I just need to get some air. Aside from the porch, I'm not going anywhere."

"You shouldn't even be doing that. Moms grounded you, remember?"

"You know what, Jude?" Callie had had enough.

"What, Callie?"

"I don't need you telling me what to do! You don't want me parenting you; don't parent me."

"Then stop treating my moms like crap!" And there it was – the alienation she'd been feeling for the past few weeks, directly from the mouth of her brother. "You've been acting like a bitch towards them all night!"

"Jude..." A soft voice spoke from behind the boy, but Callie couldn't register which woman it had come from.

"Then tell them, Jude," Callie exploded as she felt tears prick the edges of her eyes. "Tell them how much of a bitch I am! Tell them I'm mean and nasty, and really not what they should want! Tell them to cancel the adoption and just throw me into the nearest group home. Tell _your_ moms, Jude. Tell them they don't need someone like me in their lives! _Tell them!_ While you do that, I'm going to get some air!" She turned around before she could completely lose her composure and tries to pull the door open, but finds it locked. She pounded her fist on the door. "Damn it!"

Callie felt a hand on her back, rubbing gently, before hearing, "No further than the front porch, yes?" Stef reached up and unlocked the door for the girl.

The teenager didn't answer as she pulled the door open and stepped out onto the porch. Now, unlike before the argument with her brother, even the porch was stifling – nearly suffocating. Maybe it was before as well, but it definitely was now.

Feeling the need to move, she glanced back at the front door. She knew she'd be in tons of trouble, but so be it. She pulled her cell phone out of her pocket and sent a text to both Stef and Lena – "I need to walk." before hitting send and stepping off the porch. She began walking down the street, not sure on where she was going to end up.

*~THE FOSTERS~*

She didn't like the look on Callie's face when she went out on the porch. She saw tears in the girl's eyes, and for Callie to appear that vulnerable was a rarity, and Lena was pretty sure she could pinpoint why. Jude had called them his moms, exclusive to him, not inclusive of his sister. It was the reason why, despite the teenager being grounded, she understood Stef's decision to give Callie that little bit of extra space.

That is, until she went to talk to the girl and found the porch empty. The text she'd received to her phone came a little too late, for she'd already discovered the teenager missing.

"She's not on the porch." It was almost laughable how blunt her wife could be when she was worried. If their sixteen-year-old hadn't disappeared for the fourth time since Saturday, she may have actually laughed. However, all they knew of their child's whereabouts was that she had to walk. It failed to inform either mother where was walking, a cardinal sin in the Adams Foster household. "I told her to stay on the porch."

"Did you expect her to? Really, Stef?" She let out a frustrated sigh; not frustrated at her wife. Rather, frustrated at her daughter. "She's just like you."

"I don't run away from my problems, Lena."

"No, you go on a run, or out to the garage and exercise for a bit. She needed a physical outlet, just like you do sometimes."

"I'm not a sixteen-year-old..."

"I know."

"She can't just..."

"Honey! I know you're worried. I am, too..."

Stef went over to the window again, looking up and down what she could see of the street.

"I can't stay here anymore..."

However, before she could grab her keys, the front door opened, and Lena let out a sigh of relief as Callie walked through.

Stef, on the other hand, rounded on the girl. "Where the hell have you been?"

"Honey!" Lena tried to step in.

"I went for a walk," came Callie's quiet answer.

"Oh, for a walk. How nice." Lena could tell Stef was trying to contain herself. "Did you not hear what I said? Front porch only. Is that not what I said?"

Callie nodded, though Lena noticed it was with some difficulty.

"Was any part of that not clear?"

Callie shook her head, again with a bit of stiff difficulty.

"Callie," Lena cut into her wife's rant, "what's wrong with your neck?"

"N-nothing," Callie answered, her voice a little hoarse. "Just stiff. I turned weird and I think I pulled a muscle."

Lena was many things, but stupid wasn't one of them. "Callie, I know something is wrong with your neck. Come over here, please."

Callie backed away slightly. "I just want to go to bed. Can I please just go to bed?"

"No, you may not," Stef answered as Lena approached Callie and began looking at her neck, gently moving her head as Callie winced. "Four times in three days, Callie, Mama and I have found you just gone. I don't like not knowing where my kids are, _especially_ after dark."

"I'm sorry." Callie winced once again and this time, she moved away from Lena. "Stop; it hurts!"

"I'm not trying to hurt you, Callie." Lena backed away slightly, looking at the girl in front of her.

"I already told you. It's just a pulled muscle."

"Watch your tone with us, Young Lady," Stef's tone was stern. "You're in enough trouble without adding an attitude to it."

"Okay, I'm sorry." A tear fell down Callie's cheek. "I'm just tired, and my neck hurts, and I don't want to talk anymore tonight; I just want to go to bed and sleep." She wiped a tear away. "Please, just let me go to bed. Extend my grounding; take my phone; take my computer; no TV ever; make me quit my job; give me manual labor; I don't care. Just please let me go to bed."

"All right," Lena stopped her. "Calm down. Go to bed, but we will be discussing this tomorrow immediately after school, understood?"

Callie nodded as both moms stepped forward and pulled her gently into their arms, trying not to aggravate the girl's neck any further. "We love you, Callie."

"So, so much, Love." Stef kissed Callie's temple. "Please remember that."

"We're so glad you're okay."

Callie smiled as she turned and went slowly up the stairs while the moms locked the door and made their way into the kitchen, Lena a bit slower than her wife. There was something about how Callie was walking that she didn't like, and something kept telling her to go after the teen.

"You're spidey senses are tingling, aren't they?" came her wife's voice softly as Stef wrapped an arm around her wife's waist.

Lena furrowed her brow and smirked at the blonde. "What are you talking about?"

"You. You have that look on your face that you used to get when the kids were hiding something from us, and you were about to catch them in a lie."

"No, what did you call it?"

"Your spidey sense. It's something Jesus used to call your mother's intuition when he was obsessed with Spiderman. He used to always say that your spidey senses were tingling when you got a certain look in your eye," Stef raised a knowing eyebrow, "like you know there's more going on with the teen who just limped upstairs to bed?"

"So, you saw it, too? Did you also see how she was holding her side?" Lena sat down at the kitchen island and watched as Stef nodded and got the makings together to make some tea. "I just wish she would trust us enough to tell us what's going on, you know?"

"I do, Love," Stef poured the hot water into her wife's mug and then some into her own. Joining Lena, she reached across the island and took the woman's hand. "and she will. Aren't you the one always saying to give the kids time – that they'll come to us when they're ready?"

"But not when they're hurt, Stef. She was walking like she was really hurt. Something had to have happened…"

Lena was cut off by a thud on the ceiling followed by Mariana yelling, " _Moms!_ " from the top of the stairs. Both women abandoned their tea and hurried up the stairs where they saw Mariana in the hallway.

"What?!" Stef asked as she went over to check that the girl was all right.

"Callie…" and that was all she could get out before Lena hurried into the room to find Callie sprawled out, face down on the floor, not moving.

"Oh, my God…" Lena knelt beside the girl, turning her unconscious daughter over onto her lap. "Callie, honey? Can you hear me?"

"Mariana, what happened?" Stef asked the shaken Latina.

"I don't know," the girl answered. "I woke up for a minute when she walked in, asked her if she was okay. She said she was fine, but when she turned to go to her bed, she just collapsed."

"Okay, Baby," Stef nodded as she took the girl into her arms. "Go into our room and climb in bed…"

"What's going on?"

"We don't know yet, Love, but Mama and I will take care of it. Your sister will be fine. Just go lie down in our room and try to get some sleep." Stef gently pushed Mariana out the door and towards her room before pulling out her phone and dialing 9-1-1.

Lena turned her attention back to the teen in her arms. "Callie, baby, come on and open your eyes for me. Open your eyes, Honey..." When the brunette didn't move, Lena laid her down on her back and checked to see if she was at least breathing. It was shallow, but the girl was breathing. That was when she saw the bruising around her neck. "Stef…" She looked up when no answer came. "Stef!"

The blonde reappeared in the doorway, hanging up the phone. "The ambulance will be here in five minutes…"

"Look!" Lena pulled Callie's shirt collar down slightly, making the bruising even more visible.

"What the hell?" Stef leaned down, examining the bruise, which seemed to have spread up the girl's neck. Something in particular, however, caught her eye. "These look like…" She placed her hands gently over the bruise. "Oh, my…" she gasped.

"What?" When Stef allowed her emotions to show, Lena knew there was something very wrong.

"They're fingers." Stef sat back and rubbed her hands over her face. "Someone tried to…"

Lena looked into her wife's eyes and caught her meaning. She closed her eyes, and took a deep breath, trying to stifle the sob that threatened to escape. Instead, the brunette mother leaned down and placed a kiss on the teen's forehead. "Who did this to you, Baby?" she cried softly into the child's ear. "Can you wake up and tell me?"

There was no motion from the girl.

"Moms?" came another voice from the doorway.

Stef looked over and saw Jude standing there.

"Baby," she said softly as she stood, "what are you doing up?"

"I heard the noise. What's going on?" Then, he saw his sister. "Is Callie okay?!" He tried going to her, but found himself restrained by his mother.

"Love…" Stef stopped there, and Lena understood why. She didn't know what to tell him, either. Until the ambulance got there, they were going to do everything they could for the girl, but since she was breathing, albeit barely, there was very little the two could do.

"Is she okay?!"

"We don't know, Bud." Lena found herself answering honestly. She wiped a tear away. She wanted to tell him they knew for sure that Callie would be fine; she wanted to bring him the comfort she was longing for at the moment, but she also knew that Jude wasn't stupid. He could sense a lie almost as well as his mothers could. "We certainly hope so, Jude. _God,_ we hope so."

Jude seemed to accept that in its purest form – the mother trying to be as honest as possible. "I'll, uh, go wait for the ambulance," and he retreated to the stairs.

"Stef…"

"No, Lena."

"Honey, please…"

"No. She's going to be fine." Stef's voice caught. "She _has_ to be fine."

Lena nodded. Yes, Callie had to be fine. Her adoption was in three days. She had to be there for that. Nothing was stopping it this time. Lena was determined...heartbroken, scared, and worried beyond all reason, but determined. Her daughter was going to be adopted; she wasn't losing another one.

Within the next minute, Jude came back upstairs with two men and a woman with a stretcher. They put Callie on the stretcher and began taking her out to the ambulance. It was agreed that Lena would ride with them, Stef following in her SUV once Mike got to the house to be with the kids. Lena kissed her wife briefly, their tears mixing in the desperation of the moment before climbing in beside her daughter.

* * *

 **Author's Note 2: I'm sorry! I'm sorry! I'm sorry! I'm sorry! I'm sorry! In my defense...I warned you at the beginning...I know, not much of a defense, but so be it.**


	11. Chapter 11

**Author's Note: Oh, my goodness! It's an Update! Sorry it took a while…a long while…I have no excuses. I really don't. No reasons as to why this took so long. I'll thank you for reading, and sticking it out with me, though!**

 **CMA Legalese: Nothing belongs to me…except maybe my cat…WHO'S ABOUT TO HAVE KITTENS!**

* * *

Chapter 11

"Before any of you say anything, no, you can't go." Stef had just hung up the phone with Mike when all her kids, now awake after hearing the sirens and having the lights flash through the house, followed her from the upstairs landing to the first floor. She knew there could be a potential issue with Jude, but when all three of the other siblings materialized, she was hoping she could keep her resolve.

"Mom," Brandon started, "we should be there."

"Yeah," continued Mariana. "It's not like we're going to go back to sleep after all of that."

"I know, Loves," Stef answered them as she reached for her jacket and Lena's along with both of their purses. "I know, but Mama and I need to take care of this without worrying about you guys also…"

"She'd want me there," Jude's voice rang in. "I have to be with her! She wouldn't leave me alone…"

Stef let out a sigh, her heart going out to the young boy. It was true, what he said. Callie would not leave him alone, but she did months ago when the boy was in the hospital. Callie trusted her two moms with the care of the boy, and now, it was his turn to trust them with the care of his sister.

"Jude," Stef said softly, "your sister isn't alone. Mama and I will both be there with her, just like we were there with you." Stef placed her hands on his shoulders, leaning down to look him square in the eye. "She trusted us with you, remember? You think you can trust us with her?" At his reluctant nod, she took him into her arms. "I promise, Bud, and as soon as we know anything, you will _all_ be notified." She looked around at each of the children. "I promise."

A knock came on the door, and Stef opened it to let a rather disheveled Mike into the foyer.

"Mike, thanks again…" She turned to the rest of her kids. "I love you, babies."

Stef exited amidst returned sentiments, making her way to her SUV and heading toward the hospital, after sending her wife a quick text, letting her know she was on her way.

She made it in record time, almost positive she'd broken the sound barrier a few times, but to get to one of her babies that needed her, she would do it as often as possible.

Finally pulling into the parking lot of the emergency room, she found a spot relatively close to the door and threw the SUV into park. Before getting out, she had to take a few deep breaths, calming her nerves – or that was the theory, anyway. She knew her nerves wouldn't be calm until she got inside and saw that her daughter was all right.

And she would be all right.

*~THE FOSTERS~*

Lena walked through the emergency room doors to the waiting room at the same time that she saw her wife come nearly barreling through the automatic doors. The entire ride to the hospital kept replaying in her mind.

 _Lena had been holding Callie's hand for a few minutes when she heard something come from the stretcher. The tightening in her chest lifted slightly as she watched Callie's eyes open and look around. It completely alleviated once the two brown orbs met her own._

" _Callie?" she leaned over, reaching up and brushing some hair out of her daughter's face._

" _Mama?" came Callie's frightened voice. "Wha…" She tried to sit up, but found she was restrained to something._

" _Shh, Honey," Lena soothed as she stroked her daughter's hair. "You're going to be okay…"_

" _Where…"_

" _You're in an ambulance, Baby…"_

" _Why?" She looked around her, an EMT smiling at the girl's confused expression._

" _You're going to be fine, Honey," the EMT said. "We're almost there."_

 _From there, the activity centered around the girl's care as the ambulance pulled into the bay and they went inside. Lena couldn't even tell you half of what the tests were they were running, but she knew they were to see what was happening with her daughter._

 _Once Callie was out of her sight inside the Emergency Room doors, she felt her chest tighten again slightly as she stood watching doctors and nurses hook monitors and needles up to the teenager. When the medical staff cleared, she went to Callie's bedside, taking the child's hand and sitting beside her._

" _You feeling okay?" she asked the girl in the bed._

" _I'm fine, Mama," Callie's tired voice came to her._

" _No," Lena answered matter-of-factly, "You're not."_

" _But…"_

" _Callie, please don't argue with me on this. 'Fine' isn't passed out on your bedroom floor; 'fine' isn't covered in bruises; 'fine' isn't wincing in pain while you're trying to breathe. Honey, don't hide how you're feeling…"_

" _But…"_

" _But nothing, Callie. Honey, you passed out, and you're obviously in pain." She had to take a breath to calm her racing heart. "You're going to do the tests the doctor wants you to do, and you'll do them without argument." She leaned down so she could be sure she had her daughter's complete attention. "Right now,_ nothing _is more important to me than your health._ Especially _when Mom and I find you collapsed on your bedroom floor."_

Lena was brought out of her memory when she saw the blonde hurrying over toward her, and she braced herself for her wife's cop-like instincts.

"Lena!" Stef breathed into her embrace. After a brief moment, she pulled away slightly. "How is she?"

"Well," Lena began as she sat down in one of the chairs, ushering Stef to the one next to her. She looked into her wife's now very frightened eyes.

"Lena?"

"She's, uh…" Lena took a breath, trying to figure out how to break the news to Stef. "She's in surgery…"

Stef nodded and sat back. "Surgery for what?"

"Internal bleeding…" Lena caught Stef's look of panic. "Hang on a second. It's not as bad as you're thinking, thank God."

"Lena, our daughter is in surgery for internal bleeding. How isn't it bad?"

"It's not that bad…"

"I don't care, Lena. Internal bleeding is still…"

"I know, but the doctor said it wasn't enough to be fatal – yet. So, it had to be fixed…" She stopped for a moment. "…before it became an issue."

"Did the doctor say what caused her to pass out like that?"

Lena took a moment. "He's not sure. He thinks it could have been the pain level from the two cracked ribs, but he's not ruling out a concussion."

"Great…" Stef seemed to be breathing a bit easier. "Fantastic…"

Lena recognized this tactic. Stef was forever burying what she was feeling in the moment in order to process them later, but this wasn't a time that she should be. However, she also knew how stubborn her wife was.

Letting out a sigh, she stood and held her hand out.

"Come on," she whispered. "Let's go wait for Callie in her room."

"Here she is," a cheerful voice declared to the two women who were walking down the hallway towards one of the walled off rooms.

Both mothers approached the side rails of the bed as the nurse locked the wheels into place. The girl on the bed looked peaceful – probably more peaceful than she had in a long time.

"Hey, Baby," Lena whispered as she leaned down and left a kiss on the teen's forehead.

"Hi, Love," Stef also whispered while she brushed Callie's hair off her forehead.

"The surgery went well…"

Lena looked up and saw Callie's doctor entering the room. She turned to Stef to get her attention.

Stef looked up at the man who now stood at the foot of her daughter's bed. "What…"

He spoke directly to Stef, not out of disrespect to Lena, but to be sure he was not only understanding the question she was asking, but that she was also understanding his answer. "She had a small tear in her spleen which caused some internal bleeding. As I was telling your…" He paused, not sure what to call Lena.

"Wife," Lena supplied. "I'm her wife."

"Your wife, the bleeding didn't show as being life threatening, but it still needed to be stopped before it became such." The doctor hung up a few pieces of paper showing Callie's x-ray results. When he had the full attention of both mothers, he continued, "She has a fractured rib here…" He pointed to a spot on Callie's chest x-ray showing a hairline fracture on her third rib… "…and here." He pointed to another one of Callie's ribs with a slightly larger crack, but it did not break completely. "That would account for some of the bruising, but considering the amount of bruising she sustained, I'm surprised there's not more."

"How much bruising is there?" Stef asked as she turned to the doctor.

"She sustained hits all over her abdomen; her ribs are just the most prominent. There is also bruising around her neck, which I'm sure you've noticed."

"We have." Lena turned to the bed, watching for the girl's eyes to open. "Stef said they looked like…"

"Fingers, yes." The doctor confirmed Stef's initial assessment. "Someone tried to choke her, but only got a grip long enough to create the bruise."

"Which brings us to why she passed out," Stef picked up the conversation again. "Did you find anything about that?"

"As I said to your wife, I believe it to be the pain level of the two ribs as well as the torn spleen. She was conscious when she arrived in the ambulance, and if there was a head injury, it is very possible that would not have been the case. However, to be on the safe side, we did a CT scan of her head, and we are just waiting for those results to come back. As soon as they do, I will let you know."

Both women nodded their understanding.

"I'll leave you with your daughter. She should be waking up in the next twenty minutes, or so."

"Thank you."

Once the doctor had left, both women sat back down, one on either side of the girl, waiting for her to awaken. Stef had pulled out her phone and was sending a text to someone. (Lena assumed it was Mike, filling him in on the situation at the hospital.)

Lena, on the other hand, was concentrating on the girl in the bed. She kept trying to figure her out. Yesterday, they'd had a rocky start to their outing but ended up having a great time once they were in the water. She thought they'd bonded a bit, snorkeling with the leopard sharks.

Then, today, it seemed that Callie was a completely different girl. She'd skipped school. She'd handed both mothers attitude that was even much for a normal teenager. She'd gone off to God-knows-where – alone – and ended up getting beaten. However, through all of it, Lena saw something behind the girl's eyes. There was something lying deeper that she was trying to keep buried.

This was something that Lena did not like in the relationship she had with her older daughter. This was the barrier that Stef had crossed with Callie, but the girl held her at bay.

And Lena hated it.

She hated seeing her daughter repressing so much negativity just so that Lena wouldn't find out some horrible truth. She hated feeling like she was failing to provide emotional support that Callie obviously needed. She hated watching the girl constantly suffer and battle with whatever was bothering her until Stef practically drug it out of her.

"Mmf."

Both mothers looked up at the muffled groan. Callie was coming-to and had begun moving around. However, when she went to twist, she winced, letting out a whimper.

"Hey, hey," Stef whispered as she stood, getting into Callie's field of vision. "Hey, Love. You're okay. Shh."

"Wha' hapm?"

"You had to have surgery, Baby, but you're okay now." Stef smiled at the girl, but Lena could see tears in the woman's eyes.

"Mama?"

"Right here," Lena answered as she reached up and cupped Callie's cheek. "I'm right here."

Callie's eyes searched a minute until she found Lena's, and then, she smiled.

"Tired…"

"Yeah, I can imagine." Lena smiled reassuringly before brushing some hair from the girl's forehead. Lena saw Stef leave the room, knowing her wife was going to get the doctor. "Let us get the doctor, okay?"

Within a few moments, Stef returned with the doctor behind her.

"I heard a vicious rumor that you'd awakened," he said as he came up to the foot of the bed. "How're you feeling?"

"Side hurss," Callie slurred through the anesthetic.

"I'll get you something for that. Anything else hurting?"

Callie shook her head, but winced when she moved her neck.

"Okay. I'll be right back." He turned to Stef. "Can I see you a moment in the hallway?"

"Yeah, of course," Stef answered as she followed the lab-coat clad man out of the room.

"Wha's goin' on?" Callie asked Lena, grasping her hand.

"I don't know," Lena answered as she looked toward the doorway. Within a few minutes, Stef came back inside smiling. "What?"

"Her CT results finally came back," Stef answered.

"And?"

"And…no concussion that they could see, but they'd still like to keep her for the rest of the night for observation. Just to be on the safe side." Stef leaned on the foot-rail of the bed. "He's making arrangements for a bed in the pediatric ward."

Lena nodded her agreement, but Callie seemed a bit disgruntled.

"I'm no' a baby," she said, her speech beginning to clear up.

"No one is saying you are," Stef answered. "You're going into pediatrics because you're under eighteen, and because they have a bed that Mama or I can stay with you without being crammed into plastic chair." She winked at Lena. "I don't know about you, but I don't think Mama could handle sitting up in one of those chairs all night."

"Me?!" Lena exclaimed softly. "What about you?"

"What about me?"

"You're old," Callie's soft voice came from the bed.

Stef raised her eyebrows as she went back to her previous position next to Callie. "Care to try that again?"

"You're old," Callie said again, this time with a smirk on her lips.

"You're lucky I love you, kid," Stef said playfully as she kissed her daughter's forehead. "I'm just going to chalk this up to you being delirious from the anesthetic."

Lena smiled at the antics of the two, finally catching a glimpse of the girl that Callie had been the day before when they were on their boating expedition. However, she'd become quiet just as fast as she'd become snarky.

An hour later found Lena sitting beside her still-groggy, albeit awake, daughter. Stef had gone home to relieve Mike, reassure the rest of their brood, and get some rest. Lena could take the rest of the week off, and she knew that as much as Stef wanted to stay home and take care of Callie, she was not going to be able to take the time.

"Mama?" Callie's soft voice came from the bed.

"Yeah, Baby?" Lena answered her as she leaned closer to look the girl in the eye.

"There're unicorns on the walls." The girl shifted slightly, trying to get more comfortable, but winced as she twisted.

Lena scrunched up her face in confusion, but nodded slightly to go along with this conversation. "There are."

"Mariana would like this room."

"Maybe when she was younger, sure. She was all about unicorns, rainbows, and princesses." Lena smiled at the memories. "I don't know about now, though. She's still into pink, but I don't think she'd appreciate the unicorns on the walls."

Callie smiled slightly, but a tear escaped her eye, not unnoticed by her mother. Lena reached up and brushed it away, tilting her head enough that she was looking directly into Callie's eyes.

"Hey…" Lena combed her fingers through Callie's hair. "What's going on, Honey? Talk to me."

The girl turned her head and looked out the window, breaking eye contact with Lena. Then, in the quietest voice Lena had ever heard her use, she said, "She's dying."

* * *

 **Author's Note 2: (GASP)**


	12. Chapter 12

**Author's Note: Well, so much for having the time to write! Sorry for the long waits, guys. But, here is chapter 12; thank you, everyone for your support.**

 **CMA Legaleze: I do not own the Fosters; I do not own FreeForm; I do not own anything in connection with this TV Show; I only own the characters I create. Das ist alles!**

* * *

Chapter 12

"Renal failure?"

"Yeah."

"You're joking."

"No, Stef. I'm not." Lena stood from where she was leaning on the door jamb, watching Callie sleep fitfully on her bed.

"Oh, my…" Stef turned around and walked onto the landing a bit, away from the girls' door. Stef was stunned. The girl that she'd seen with Callie the day that her daughter skipped school was young. Renal failure, Stef thought, would have been more in older adults. "She's so young! She can't be more than…"

"…twenty-three." Lena turned toward her wife and began heading into her bedroom to lay down for a while. "Callie told me." Once the two women were in their room, Lena sat on the chair while Stef stood at the side of the bed. "And do you know what Callie asked me?"

"Should I sit down for this?" Stef knew her daughter. A part of her wanted to ask, but part of her, too, was afraid of the answer.

"Probably," Lena's answer came before she rubbed her hands over her face.

Stef sat, giving her wife her full attention.

"She wanted me to have her blood tested to see if she was a match for a transplant."

The blonde's heart stopped. She had to take a moment for the room to stop spinning. "You said, 'No,' right?"

Lena looked up at Stef's face and instantly cringed.

"Lena…" Stef let out an exasperating sigh. "You let her get tested?"

"It's only a finger prick, Stef." Lena stood and paced to the door. "It's not like he drew a vial."

"You still let her get tested!" Stef stood and turned to where Lena was pacing. "Honey, what if she's a match? She's going to want to go through with this, and if or when the time comes, what do we tell her then?"

"We tell her no." Lena stopped pacing and looked Stef in the eye. "Stef, she was hysterical last night, and it wasn't just the anesthesia – even though I think that helped. Apparently, this girl – Alex, is her name – is like a sister to her. She was the big sister in one of their first foster homes, and Callie's never forgotten that. She was the girl that Callie met up with yesterday, and that's when she found out." Lena took a breath.

"Once she told me, she started crying so hard…God, I thought she cried hard after your talk at your dad's funeral. She started begging me to let her be tested, and for twenty minutes, I fought her on it. She needed to calm down so she could rest, and it seemed that being tested was the only way it was going to happen.

"So, I went and asked her doctor what it entailed. It was a finger prick, but when I told him about it, I asked him to 'take his time with the results'. He understood my meaning, pricked her finger, and told her he'd know in the morning. She calmed down after that. She didn't fall asleep, but she calmed down considerably."

Stef's heart broke for her brunette baby. This Alex girl must have really meant something to her.

"What did the doctor say?" Stef moved closer to her wife. "Is she a match?"

Lena nodded. "He told her no."

Stef nodded. "How was she after that?"

"Quiet," Lena sat down on the bed where Stef had been a little bit ago, "but you could tell she didn't like his answer." Stef sat next to her, reaching out to comfort her wife. "You came for us shortly thereafter."

"My Love," Stef sighed as she pulled Lena into a side hug, resting her wife's head on her shoulder.

"We're going to need to keep an eye on her," Lena said quietly after a moment. "When Alex finally does pass, I want us to be ready."

"We will be, Love." Stef wasn't about to allow her daughter to go through something like this alone. "We'll be there for her."

*~THE FOSTERS~*

The sun shone brightly through the drawn curtains of her bedroom, a ray hitting her in the face. Slightly annoyed, Callie grunted and opened her eyes, squinting in the bright light.

She looked around at her surroundings, confused. Why was she in her bed? Why wasn't she in school today?

Callie tried to sit up, and she was quickly reminded of what had happened the night before. Her sides screamed at her for the sudden movement. Within a few seconds, both mothers were rushing into the room and knelt down next to her, but she couldn't hear what either of them were saying.

She was on the verge of hyperventilating when she finally heard one of their voices, "You're okay, Baby. Calm; breathe…" Though, she couldn't tell you which mother said it. She was just thankful that she heard it at all. Once the voice got through, the pain seemed to subside slightly – at least enough for her to begin breathing normally.

"Lie still, Love." That was Stef. "You're okay. You're at home."

"Do you understand, Honey?" And there was Lena. "Do you understand what we're saying?"

Callie slowly nodded in the affirmative as she took a deep breath, calming her racing heart.

"Good girl." She felt a hand on her forehead, brushing her hair away from her eyes as the weight on the bed shifted slightly.

"Hurt…"

"I know, Baby," Lena cooed in her ear as she kept running her fingers through Callie's hair. "I know. Mom's gone to get you your pain meds, and you're going to take a dose."

A soft whimper came from the bed. "Mama…"

"Shh, my baby," Lena whispered as she leaned forward and brushed her hand across Callie's cheek. "Shh…"

"Here you go, Babe," Stef's voice came from behind. "Just lean up a bit…" She handed Callie the pill, who swallowed them with the water with relative ease – or so that's what she told herself to justify the pain shooting down her back.

Though, she was much more comfortable once she was still again, but she didn't attempt moving again, either. That seemed to be the easier direction to go to keep her pain level at a tolerable level – again, all things being relative.

Eventually, she felt her head get foggy, and she closed her eyes, allowing the medicine to work its magic.

*~THE FOSTERS~*

"So, what are you doing home, anyway?" Lena asked as Stef took a place across from her at the kitchen table a few minutes later with a sandwich, each, in front of them. "I thought you worked today, and I was staying with the patient."

Stef smiled tightly before answering, which put Lena on alert. "You remember Carl, the new recruit?"

"The one you said you may end up working with?"

"Yeah." Stef took a drink of water. "He's having some kind of family trouble and needed someone to pick up his shift last night…"

"Stef…"

"I know; I know…but it's not like I was sleeping, anyway. Mike came over and stayed with the kids while I went into work. He's working my shift today and tomorrow; I'm working again for him tonight…"

"Stef…"

"Love, it's only two nights, and one of them is done."

"I don't like you working overnight; you know that!" Lena got up and cleared the now empty dishes and placed them in the sink.

"I know, Babe, but I'll be fine. Since he's in training, they're giving him the easy areas. At most, I'm writing speeding tickets and accompanying repo trucks." Stef stood and wrapped her arms around Lena's waist. "I love you; you know that. I'm being safe. I promise." She unwrapped her arms and stood back slightly. "Now, if it's okay, I'm going to go lay down until I have to get up and get ready."

Lena nodded. "I love you, too." But before Stef got out of the kitchen, she called her back. "It's just for one more night, right?"

Stef smiled. "Yes, Love. One more night, and then I'm off for three days and back on day shift with Carl as my new partner."

"And no more nights?"

"I will avoid them like the plague."

Lena smiled. "Thank you."

Stef smiled back, winked, and headed up the stairs to bed while Lena turned back to the dishes in the sink.

~*THE FOSTERS*~

"Is Callie home?" Jude practically came barreling through the front door, standing in the foyer, looking in at Lena on the living room couch.

"Yes," Lena answered him, "but she's resting. She's in a lot of pain, buddy, so let's leave her be for right now, okay?" Lena held her arms out, inviting the boy to join her. "Come over here and tell me about your day."

Jude went over to his mother and sat in her arms, but rather than talk about his day, he just quietly sat.

"Nothing exciting happen today?"

He shook his head.

Lena tilted his head toward her, and when he finally looked her in the eyes, she asked, "Everything okay?"

"I just want to see Callie," he answered her.

"You're sure that's all?"

He nodded.

After a moment, she nodded. "Okay, but she's sleeping, so don't wake her. Okay?"

He nodded again, shedding his backpack by Lena's feet. "I have a paper in my backpack for you. It's from Miss Porter."

Lena leaned over to pick up her son's bag and open it.

"Um," Jude hesitated. "Maybe we can talk about it later?"

His mother froze. "Talk about…"

"The paper from Miss Porter."

"What is the paper, Jude?" When Jude hesitated, again, Lena put the bag down and leaned forward. "It would be better for you to be honest with me now than I find out later."

"I _am_ being honest with you. I told you about the paper; I just don't want to talk about it right now."

"Jude…"

"It's in my blue folder." And with that, he went up the stairs to his sister's room where he saw her lying awake, staring through the doorway. He smiled slightly and entered, knowing Callie wouldn't object.

"Hey," he said softly as he approached the bed. "How are you feeling?"

"Eh, I'm okay." Callie smiled and turned over, making room on the bed for him to sit down. "How was your day?"

"It sucked." Jude sat down beside her legs, careful when he saw her wince.

"I'm sorry, bud. Why'd it suck?"

Jude shrugged. "I got into a fight with another kid."

Callie tried to sit up, but when she winced in pain, she laid back down. "Jude…"

"What? He started it, and he had it coming!"

"Still, Jude. You can't get into fights!"

"Oh, well. It happened, and Miss Porter suspended me for the rest of the week." He looked toward the door. "Mama is probably reading the paper now."

"No," came another voice from the door. Both children looked over and saw Lena standing in the doorway with the paper in her hand, "Mama read it." She walked into the room, holding the paper in her hand. "And you are correct that we will be talking about it later with Mom once she's awake, but for now, I want you in your room until dinner."

"What are we discussing with mom?" A fourth voice came from the hallway a few seconds before Stef's head appeared in the doorway.

"This," Lena answered her as she held out the suspension slip to Stef.

Stef took it and read it over, her eyebrows shooting to the sky. "Jude! Wha…"

"Later," Lena cut her off. "Right now, I have to start getting dinner ready, and he needs to be in his room." She looked back at Jude, who began walking out of the room, heading toward his own.

He knew his mothers would be disappointed, but considering what the kid had said, he had no regrets.

*~THE FOSTERS~*

Lena stepped down into the kitchen, thinking about what she was going to make for dinner. Her eyes fell on the basket in the center of the kitchen island, where she saw a few fruits adorning it, with a butternut squash sticking out. She smiled. Most of her kids weren't big fans of the gourd. In fact, if you even mention the thing to anyone, the dish would rot in the refrigerator.

However, Callie had shared a recipe with her a few months back in a rare mother-daughter moment they had that her mother used to make with it. It was a huge success with the entire family, and this dish was one of Callie's favorites.

Yes, she'd make that tonight, with some baked chicken and fresh green beans. Dinner, done.

"So, Jude's fighting now?" Stef asked as she, too, stepped down into the kitchen.

"I couldn't believe it, either," Lena said as she handed Stef the butternut squash, "until I went upstairs and heard him talking to Callie." She pulled the chicken out of the refrigerator and began seasoning them.

"What could be going on with him?" Stef wondered as she sliced through the squash. "First, he skips school, and no one can find him, and now a fight?"

"I know, but I don't know what's going on with him. I tried getting him to talk about his day, but he didn't say anything. He wanted to see his sister." She put the pan of chicken in the oven and set the timer before going over to work on the green beans. "Maybe it has something to do with her?"

"Maybe." Stef put the squash in the microwave for ten minutes. "It doesn't excuse it, though."

"Oh, absolutely not. He's suspended for the rest of the week, and my thought is to ground him for the rest of this week, and next. He knows fighting isn't acceptable in this household."

"Exactly." The blonde pulled the squash out of the microwave and brought it over to the table where she continued to prepare it. "What about Callie?"

"What about her?"

"How has she been since I went to sleep?"

"She slept, mostly. I told Jude to leave her be, so finding them together was a bit of a surprise. She was awake, and I just don't know if he woke her, or if she was awake to begin with."

"Okay. We'll get to the bottom of this with Jude. I promise." Stef walked over and gave her wife a quick kiss before putting the prepared butternut squash into the oven with the chicken. She turned back toward her wife. "What else do you need for dinner?"

"Um…" Lena looked around. "If you're up for an errand, how about going to the store and getting some rolls?"

Stef nodded slightly and glanced toward the ceiling. "Sounds like a good idea. I'll take Jude with me; see if I can get him to talk."

Lena smirked and shook her head. "Always the cop, huh?"

Stef winked. "Always."

* * *

 **Author's Note II: So, in other news, I'm playing with an AU idea in which Lena fosters a four-year-old Callie (yes, just Callie). I should hopefully be publishing the first chapter before Christmas.**


End file.
